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Mary. Frontispiece. 

The Execution of Mary, Queen of Scots, seep.iis. 



ALTnnUS' YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY 



HISTORY 



or 



MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS 



WITH rORTY-riYE ILLUSTRATIONS 





Bmv 



5*4326 



,^5 1" ■ 



43742 



Libritry of Con^res* 

•wu CoptEs Heceived 
SEP 5 1900 

Cc^yn'cht antry 
SECONO COPY. 

Dr*^v«r«d t« 

OROtrtDtVISlON, 

SEP 7 1900 



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CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. i-AQE 

Mary's Childhood 

CHAPTER II. 
Her Education in France 

CHAPTER III. 
The Great Wedding . • • • 

CHAPTER IV. 
Misfortunes 

CHAPTER V. 
Return to Scotland . . . • 

CHAPTER' VI. 
Mary and Lord Darnley 

CHAPTER VII. 

Rizzio . • • 

CHAPTER VIII. 

Bothwell 

CHAPTER IX. 
The Fall of Bothwell . • • • 

CHAPTER X. 
Loch Leven Castle . • • • 

CHAPTER XL 
The Long Captivity . . • • 

CHAPTER XII. 

The End * 

(v) 



22 
39 
57 
77 
96 
115 
135 
159 
177 
197 
211 




Mary.vi 



Loch Leveu Castle. 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



facing 



facinf 



facing 



Execution of Mary, Queen of Scots, Fronthpiece. 

Loch Leven Castle . • • • P^S^ !! 

Mary's " Memento Mori " Watch . . • " ^"i 

Mary Stuart as the Widow of Francis II. 

Headpiece, Chapter I. . 

Mary's First Levee 

Plan of the Palace of Linlithgow 

Linlithgow Palace 

View from Mary's Window . 

Headpiece, Chapter 11. 

Mary, Queen of Scots . 

Headpiece, Chapter III. 

Church of Notre Dame 

Mary and her Young Husband, Francis II 

Headpiece, Chapter IV. 

EUzabeth, Queen of England 

Headpiece, Chapter V. 

Landing of Mary at Leith . 

Holyrood Palace . 

Headpiece, Chapter VI. 

Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley 

The Earl of Murray . 

Headpiece, Chapter VII. 

Plan of Holyrood House 

Murder of Rizzio 

Room in which Mary was Imprisoned . • 

(vii) 



facinj 



facin,! 



facing 



X 

1 

8 

10 
11 
21 
22 
36 
39 
46 
54 
57 
76 
77 
86 
88 
96 
106 
110 
115 
127 
130 
134 



Vlll ILLUSTRATI 


ONS. 






Headpiece, Chapter VIII. 




. page 135 


Cradle of James I. 




. ' 


' 141 


Plan of Darnley's House 




. ' 


'146 


Edinburgh Castle 




. ' 


' 158 


Headpiece, Chapter IX. 




. ' 


' 159 


Surrender of Mary at Carberry 


Hill 


facing ' 


' 170 


Both well Captured by a Danish 


Ship 


. ' 


' 176 


Headpiece, Chapter X. 




. ' 


'177 


Plan of Loch Leven Castle . 




. ' 


' 180 


Mary in Captivity 




facing ' 


' 182 


Mary Abdicating the Throne 




a ( 


' 186 


Headpiece, Chapter XI. 




. ' 


' 197 


IMary Protesting Against her d 


iptivity 


facing ' 


' 206 


Assassination of the Earl of Murray 


U ( 


' 208 


Headpiece, Chapter XII. 






' 211 


Trial of Mary, Queen of Scots 




facing <■ 


' 216 


^lary Hearing her Death Warrant 


U ( 


'220 


Mary's Tomb in Westminster Abbey 


. * 


'232 




Mary's " Memento Mori" Watch. 



INTRODUCTORY. 



The story of Mary Stuart is full of romance 
and pathos. She was a queen before she was 
a week old, and her childhood was passed at 
the Court of France, where she was carefully 
educated. Married at the age of sixteen to the 
oldest son of Henry II. of France, she became a 
widow two years later, and then, her mother, 
Mary of Guise, dying amid the throes of the Re- 
formation and leaving the kingdom of Scotland 
without a government, M'ary hastened to her 
native land and began an auspicious reign. 
Suitors for her hand sprang up from every quar- 
ter. Sweden, Denmark and France; Austria and 
Spain offered to share their thrones witli the 
daughter of James V.; royal dukes and belted 
earls were proposed as candidates for her 
hand. Her choice fell upon her weak and 
vicious cousin, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley. 

From tlie tragic death of Darnley to the day 
when Mary laid her head upon the block, her 
life was a stormy one ; but when at last she met 
her fate at the hands of Elizabeth it was with 
the dignity of a queen and the resignation of 

a martyr. 

(ix) 




Mary, x 



Mary Stuart as the Widow of Francis II. 




MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 



CHAPTER I. 



MARYS CHILDHOOD. 



Travelers who go into Scotland take a great 
interest in visiting, among other places, a 
certain room in the ruins of an old palace, 
where Queen Mary was born. Queen Mary- 
was very beautiful, but she was very unfortu- 
nate and unhappy. Everybody takes a 
strong interest in her story, and this interest 
attaches, in some degree, to the room where 
her sad and sorrowful life was begun. 

The palace is near a little village called Lin- 
lithgow. The village has but one long street, 
which consists of ancient stone houses. North 
of it is a little lake, or rather pond : they call it, 
in Scotland, a loch. The palace is between the 
village and the loch ; it is upon a beautiful swell 
of land which projects out into the water. There 



2 MARY QUEEN OF BOOTS. 

is a very small island in the middle of the loch, 
and the shores are bordered with fertile fields. 
The palace, when entire, was square, with an 
open space or court in the center. There was 
a beautiful stone fountain in the center of this 
court, and an arched gateway through which 
horsemen and carriages could ride in. The 
doors of entrance into the palace were on the 
inside of the court. 

The palace is now in ruins. A troop of sol- 
diers came to it one day in time of war, after 
Mary and her mother had left it, and spent the 
night there : they spread straw over the floors 
to sleep upon. In the morning, when they 
went away, they wantonly set the straw on 
fire, and left it burning, and thus the palace 
was destroyed. Some of the lower floors 
were of stone ; but all the upper floors and 
the roof were burned, and all the wood- 
work of the rooms, and the doors and win- 
dow-frames. Since then the palace has never 
been repaired, but remains a melancholy pile 
of ruins. 

The room where Mary was born had a stone 
floor. The rubbish which has fallen from 
above has covered it with a sort of soil, and 
grass and weeds grow up all over it. It is a 
very melancholy sight to see. The visitors 
who go into the room walk mournfully about, 
trying to imagine how Queen Mary looked^ as 



MAEY'S CHILDHOOD. 8 

an infant in her mother's arms, and reflecting 
on the recklessness of the soldiers in wantonly- 
destroying so beautiful a palace. Then they 
go to the window, or, rather, to the crumbling 
opening in the wall where the window once 
was, and look out upon the loch, now so de- 
serted and lonely ; over their heads it is all 
open to the sky. 

Mary's father was King of Scotland. At the 
time that Mary was born, he was away from 
home engaged in war with the King of England, 
who had invaded Scotland. In the battles 
Mary's father was defeated, and he thought 
that the generals and nobles who commanded 
his army allowed the English to conquer them 
on purpose to betray him. This thought over- 
whelmed him with vexation and anguish. He 
pined away under the acuteness of his suffer- 
ings, and just after the news came to him that 
his daughter Mary was born, he died. Thus 
Mary became an orphan, and her troubles 
commenced, at the very beginning of her days. 
She never saw her father, and her father never 
saw her. Her mother was a French lady ; 
her name was Mary of Guise. Her own name 
was Mary Stuart, but she is commonly called 
Mary Queen of Scots. 

As Mary was her father's only child, of 
course, when he died, she became Queen of 
Scotland, although she was only a few days 



4 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

old. It is customary, in such a case, to appoint 
some distinguished person to govern the king- 
dom, in the name of the young queen, until 
she grows up : such a person is called a regent. 
Mary's mother wished to be the regent until 
Mary became of age. 

It happened that in those days, as now, the 
government and people of France were of the 
Catholic religion. England, on the other hand, 
was Protestant. There is a great difference 
between the Catholic and the Protestant sys- 
tems. The Catholic Church, though it extends 
nearly all over the world, is banded together, 
as the reader is aware, under one man — the 
Pope — who is the great head of the Church, 
and who lives in state at Rome. The Catho-" 
lies have, in all countries, many large and 
splendid churches, which are ornamented with 
paintings and images of the Virgin Mary and 
of Christ. They perform great ceremonies in 
these churches, the priests being dressed in 
magnificent costumes, and walking in proces- 
sions, with censers of incense burning as they 
go. The Protestants, oi>-^'the othai^r hand, do 
not like these ceremonies ; they regard such 
outward acts of worship as mere useless parade, 
and the images as idols. They themselves 
have smaller and plainer churches, and call 
the people together in them to hear sermons, 
and to offer up simple prayers. 



MARY S CHILDHOOD. O 

In the time of Mary, England was Protes- 
tant and France was Catholic, while Scotland 
was divided, though most of the people were 
Protestants. The two parties were very much 
excited against each other, and often persecuted 
each other with extreme cruelty. Sometimes 
the Protestants would break into the Catholic 
churches, and tear down and destroy the paint- 
ings and the images, and the other symbols of 
worship, all which the Catholics regarded with 
extreme veneration ; this exasperated the Cath- 
olics, and when they became powerful in their 
turn, they would seize the Protestants and im- 
prison them, and sometimes burn them to 
death, by tying them to a stake and piling 
fagots of wood about th'em, and then setting 
the heap on fire. 

Queen Mary's mother was a Catholic, and 
for that reason the people of Scotland were not 
willing that she should be regent. There were 
one or two other persons, moreover, who 
claimed the office. One was a certain noble- 
man called the Earl of Arran. He was a Prot- 
estant. The Earl of Arran was the next heir 
to the crown, so that if Mary had died in her 
infancy, he would have been king.^ He thought 
that this was a reason why he should be regent, 
and govern the kingdom until Mary became 
old enough to govern it herself. Many other 
persons, however, considered this rather a rea- 



6 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

son why he should not be regent ; for they 
thought he would be naturally interested in 
wishing that Mary should not live, since if she 
died he would himself become king, and that 
therefore he would not be a safe protector 
for her. However, as the Earl of Arran 
was a Protestant, and as Mary's mother 
was a Catholic, and as the Protestant in- 
terest was the strongest, it was at length 
decided that Arran should be the regent, 
and govern the country until Mary should be 
of age. 

It is a curious circumstance that Mary's birth 
put an end to the war between England and 
Scotland, and that in a very singular way. The 
King of England had been fighting against 
Mary's father, James, for a long time, in order 
to conquer the country and annex it to Eng- 
land ; and now that James was dead, and 
Mary had become queen, with Arran for the 
regent, it devolved on Arran to carry on the 
war. But the King of England and his gov- 
ernment, how that the young queen was born, 
conceived of a new plan. The king had a little 
son, named Edward, about four years old, 
who, of course, would become King of Eng- 
land in his place when he should himself die. 
Now he thought it would be best for him to 
conclude a peace with Scotland, and agree 
with the Scottish government that, as soon as 



MARY S CHILDHOOD. 7 

Mary wa9 old enough, she should become 
Edward's wife, and the two kingdoms be 
united in that way. 

The name of this King of England was Hen- 
ry the Eighth. He was a very headstrong and 
determined man. This, his plan, might have 
been a very good one ; it was certainly much 
better than an attempt to get possession of 
Scotland by fighting for it ; but he was very 
far from being as moderate and just as he 
should have been in the execution of his de- 
sign. The first thing was to ascertain whether 
Mary was a strong and healthy child ; for if 
he should make a treaty of peace, and give up 
all his plans of conquest, and then if Mary, 
after living feebly a few years, should die, all 
his plans would fail. To satisfy him on this 
point, they actually had some of the infant's 
clothes removed in the presence of his ambas- 
sador, in order that the ambassador might see 
that her form was perfect, and her limbs vig- 
orous and strong. The nurse did this with 
great pride and pleasure, Mary's mother stand- 
ing by. The nurse's name was Janet Sinclair. 
The ambassador wrote back to Henry, the 
King of England, that little Mary was "as 
goodly a child as he ever saw." So King 
Henry VHI. was confirmed in his design of 
having her for the wife of his son. 

King Henry VHI. accordingly changed all 



8 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

his plans. He made a peace with the Earl of 
Arran. He dismissed the prisoners that he 
had taken, and sent them home kindly. If he 
had been contented with kind and gentle 
measures like these, he might have succeeded 
in them, although there was, of course, a strong 
party in Scotland opposed to them. INIary's 
mother was opposed to them, for she was a 
Catholic and a French lady, and she wished to 
have her daughter become a Catholic as she 
grew up, and marry a French prince. All the 
Catholics in Scotland took her side. Still Hen- 
ry's plans might have been accomplished, per- 
haps, if he had been moderate and conciliating 
in the efforts which he made to carry them 
into effect. 

But Henry VHI. was headstrong and obsti- 
nate. He demanded that Mary, since she was 
to be his son's wife, should be given up to him 
to be taken into England, and educated there, 
under the care of persons whom he should ap- 
point. He also demanded that the Parliament 
of Scotland should let him have a large share 
in the government of Scotland, because he 
was going to be the father-in-law of the young 
queen. The Parliament would not agree to 
either of these plans ; they were entirely un- 
willing to allow their little queen to be carried 
off to another country, and put under the charge 
of so rough and rude a man. Then they were 




Mary , face p. S 



Mary Stuart' a first Levee. 



maky's childhood. 9 

unwilling", too, to give him any share of the 
government during Mary's minority. Both 
these measures were entirely inadmissible ; 
they would, if adopted, have put both the in- 
fant Queen of Scotland and the kingdom itself 
completely in the power of one who had al- 
ways been their greatest enemy. 

Henry, finding that he could not induce the 
Scotch government to accede to these plans, 
gave them up at last, and made a treaty of 
marriage between his son and Mary, with the 
agreement that she might remain in Scotland 
until she was ten years old, and that then 
she should come to England and be under his 
care. 

All this time, while these grand negotiations 
were pending: between 'two mighty nations 
about her marriage, little Mary was uncon- 
scious of it all, sometimes reposing quietly in 
Janet Sinclair's arms, sometimes looking out 
of the windows of the Castle of Linlithgow to 
see the swans swim upon the lake, and some- 
times, perhaps, creeping about upon the palace 
floor, where the earls and barons who came 
to visit her mother, clad in armor of steel, 
looked upon her with pride and pleasure. The 
palace where she lived was beautifully situated, 
as has been before remarked, on the borders 
of a lake. It was arranged somewhat in the 
following manner ; 

2-Mar7 



10 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

Plan of the Palace of Linlithgow. 




I*Wtk 







1 Great liall. 1 


!a 


Court- 

U 

jar.l. 


S3 













Churcli-yard. 



a. Room where Mary was born. e. Entrance through 
great gates. w. Bow-window projecting toward the 
water, d. Den where they kept a lion. /. /. Trees. 

There was a beautiful fountain in the center 
of the courtyard, where water spouted out 
from the mouths of carved images, and fell 
into marble basins below. The ruins of this 
fountain and of the images remain there still. 
The den at d was a round pit, like a well, 
which you could look down into from above : 
it was about ten feet deep. They used to keep 
lions in such dens near the palaces and castles 
in those days. A lion in a den was a sort of 
plaything in former times, as a parrot or a pet 
Iamb IS now : this was in keeping with the 



MARY S CHILDHOOD. 



u 



fierce and warlike spirit of the age. If they 
had a lion there in Mary's time, Janet often, 
doubtless, took her little charge out to see it, 
and let her throw down food to it from above. 
The den is there now. You approach it upon 




Linlithgow Palace. 

the top of a broad embankment, which is as 
high as the depth of the den, so that the bot- 
tom of the den is level with the surface of the 
ground, v/hich makes it always dry. There 
is a hole, too, at the bottom, through the wall, 
where they used to put the lion in. 

Mary remained here at Linlithgow for a year 



1^ MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

or two ; but when she was about nine months 
old, they concluded to have the great ceremony 
of the coronation performed, as she was by 
that time old enough to bear the journey to 
Stirling Castle, where the Scottish kings and 
queens were generally crowned. The corona- 
tion of a queen is an event which always ex- 
cites a very deep and universal interest among 
all persons in the realm ; and there is a pecul- 
iar interest felt when, as was the case in this 
instance, the queen to be crov^aied is an infant 
just old enough to bear the journey. There 
was a very great interest felt in Marys corona- 
tion. The different courts and monarchs of 
Europe sent ambassadors to be present at 
the ceremony, and to pay their respects to 
the infant queen ; and Stirling became, for 
the time being, the center of universal attrac- 
tion. 

Stirling is in the very heart of Scotland. It 
is a castle, built upon a rock, or rather, upon a 
rocky hill, which rises like an island out of the 
midst of a vast region of beautiful and fertile 
country, rich and verdant beyond description. 
Beyond the confines of this region of beauty, 
dark mountains rise on all sides ; and wher- 
ever you are, whether riding along the roads 
in the plain, or climbing the declivities of the 
mountains, you see Stirling Castle, from every 
point, capping its rocky hill, the center and 



Mary's childhood. 13 

ornament of the broad expanse of beauty 
which surrounds it. 

Stirling Castle is north of Linlithgow, and is 
distant about fifteen or twenty miles from it. 
The road to it lies not far from the shores of the 
Firth of Forth, a broad and beautiful sheet of 
water. The castle, as has been before re- 
marked, was on the summit of a rocky hill. 
There are precipitous crags on three sides of 
the hill, and a gradual approach by a long 
ascent on the fourth side. At the top of this 
ascent you enter the great gates of the castle, 
crossing a broad and deep ditch by means of a 
drawbridge. You enter then a series of paved 
courts, with towers and walls around them, 
and finally come to the more interior edifices, 
where the private apartments are situated, 
and where the little queen was crowned. 

It was an occasion of great pomp and cere- 
mony, though Mary, of course, was uncon- 
scious of the meaning of it all. She was sur- 
rounded by barons and earls, by ambassadors 
and princes from foreign courts, and by the 
principal lords and ladies of the Scottish no- 
bility, all dressed in magnificent costumes. 
They held little Mary up, and a cardinal, that 
is, a great dignitary of the Roman Catholic 
Church, placed the crown upon her head. 
Half pleased with the glittering show, and 
half frightened at the strange faces which she 



14 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

saw everywhere around her, she gazed uncon- 
sciously upon the scene, while her mother, who 
could better understand its import, was elated 
with pride and joy. 

Linlithgow and Stirling are in the open and 
cultivated part of Scotland. All the northern 
and western part of the country consists of vast 
masses of mountains, with dark and somber 
glens among them, which are occupied solely 
by shepherds and herdsmen with their flocks 
and herds. This mountainous region was 
called the Highlands, and the inhabitants of it 
were the Highlanders. They were a wild and 
warlike class of men, and their country was 
seldom visited by either friend or foe. At the 
present time there are beautiful roads all 
through the Highlands, and stage-coaches and 
private carriages roll over them every summer, 
to take tourists to see and admire the pictur- 
esque and beautiful scenery ; but in the days 
of Mary the whole region was gloomy and 
desolate, and almost inaccessible. 

Mary remained in Linlithgow and Stirling 
for about two years, and then, as the country 
was becoming more and more disturbed by the 
struggles of the great contending parties — those 
who were ni favor of the Catholic religion and 
alliance with France on the one hand and of 
those in favor of the Protestant religion and 
alliance with England on the other hand — they 



MARY'S CHILDHOOD. 15 

concluded to send her into the Highlands for 
safety. 

It was not far into the country of the High- 
lands that they concluded to send her, but only 
into the borders of it. There was a small lake 
on the southern margin of the wild and moun- 
tainous country, called the Lake of Menteith. 
In this lake was an island named Inchmahome, 
the word inch being the name for island in the 
language spoken by the Highlanders. This 
island, which was situated in a very secluded 
and solitary region, was selected as Mary's 
place of residence. She was about four years 
old when they sent her to this place. Several 
persons went with her to take care of her, and 
to teach her. In fact, everything was provided 
for her which could secure her improvement 
and happiness. Her mother did not forget 
that she would need playmates^ and so she 
selected four little girls of about the same age 
with the little queen herself, and invited them 
to accompany her. They were daughters of 
the noblemen and high officers about the 
court. It is very singular that these girls were 
all named Mary. Their names in full were as 
follows : 

Mary Beaton, 

Mary Fleming, 

Mary Livingstone, 

Mary Seaton. 



16 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

These, with Mary Stuart, which was Queen 
Mary's name, made five girls of four or five 
years of age, all named Mary. 

Mary lived two years in this solitary island. 
She had, however, all the comforts and conven- 
iences of life, and enjoyed herself with her four 
Maries very much. Of course she knew noth- 
ing, and thought nothing of the schemes and 
plans of the great governments for having her 
married, when she grew up, to the young Eng- 
lish prince, who was then a little boy of about 
her own age, nor of the angry disputes in 
Scotland to which this subject gave rise. It 
did give rise to very serious disputes. Mary's 
mother did not like the plan at all. As she 
was herself a French lady and a Catholic, she 
did not wish to have her daughter marry a 
prince who was of the English royal family, 
and a Protestant. All the Catholics in Scot- 
land took her side. At length the Earl. of 
Arran, who was the regent, changed to that 
side ; and finally the government, being thus 
brought over, gave notice to King Henry VIII. 
that the plan must be given up, as they had 
concluded, on the whole, that Mary should 
not marry his son. 

King Henry was very much incensed. He 
declared that Mary should marry his son, and 
he raised an army and sent it into Scotland to 
make war upon the Scotch again, and compel 



Mary's childhood. 17 

them to consent to the execution of the plan. 
He was at this time beginning to be sick, but 
his sickness, instead of softening his temper, 
only made him the more ferocious and cruel. 
He turned against his best friends. He grew 
worse, and was evidently about to die ; but he 
was so irritable and angry that for a long time 
no one dared to tell him of his approaching 
dissolution, and he lay restless, and wretched, 
and agitated with political animosities upon 
his dying bed. At length some one ventured 
to tell him that his end was near. When he 
found that he must die, he resigned himself to 
his fate. He sent for an archbishop to come 
and see him, but he was speechless when the 
prelate came, and soon afterward expired. 

The English government, however, after his 
death, adhered to his plan of compelling the 
Scotch to make Mary the wife of his son. Xhey 
sent an army into Scotland. A great battle 
was fought, and the Scotch were defeated. The 
battle was fought at a place not far from Edin- 
burgh, and near the sea. It was so near the 
sea that the English fired upon the Scotch army 
from their ships, and thus assisted their troops 
upon the shore. The armies had remained 
several days near each other before coming to 
battle, and during all this time the city of Edin- 
burgh was in a state of great anxiety and sus- 
pense, as they expected that their city would 



18 MARY QUEEN OP SCOTS. 

be attacked by the English if they should con- 
quer in the battle. The English army did, in 
fact, advance toward Edinburgh after the bat- 
tle was over, and would have got possession 
of it had it not been for the castle. There is 
a very strong castle in the very heart of Edin- 
burgh upon the summit of a rocky hill. 

These attempts of the English to force the 
Scotch government to consent to Mary's mar- 
riage only made them the more determined to 
prevent it. A great many who were not op- 
posed to it before, became opposed to it now, 
when they saw foreign armies in the country 
destroying the towns and murdering the people. 
They said they had no great objection to the 
match, but that they did not like the mode of 
wooing. They sent to France to ask the French 
king to send over an army to aid them, and 
promised him that if he would do so they 
would agree that Mary should marry his son. 
His son's name was Francis. 

The French king was very much pleased 
with this plan. He sent an army of six thou- 
sand men into Scotland to assist the Scotch 
against their English enemies. It was ar- 
ranged, also, as little Mary was now hardly 
safe among all these commotions, even in her 
retreat in the island of Inchmahome, to send 
her to France to be educated there, and to live 



MARY'S CHILDHOOD. 19 

there until she was old enough to be married. 
The same ships which brought the army from 
France to Scotland, were to carry Mary and 
her retinue from Scotland to France. The four 
Maries went with her. 

They bade their lonely island farewell, and 
traveled south till they came to a strong castle 
on a high, rocky hill, on the banks of the River 
Clyde. The name of this fortress is Dumbar- 
ton Castle. Almost all the castles of those 
times were built upon precipitous hills, to in- 
crease the difficulties of the enemies in ap- 
proaching them. The Rock of Dumbarton is 
a very remarkable one. It stands close to the 
bank of the river. There are a great many 
ships and steamboats continually passing up 
and down the Clyde, to and from the great city 
of Glasgow, and all the passengers on board 
gaze with great interest, as they sail by, on 
the Rock of Dumbarton, with the castle walls 
on the sides, and the towers and battlements 
crowning the summit. ^"^ In Mary's time there 
was comparatively very little shipping on the 
river, but the P'rench fleet was there, waiting 
opposite the castle to receive Mary and the 
numerous persons who were to go in her 
train. 

* Travelers who visit Scotland from this country at the 
present day, usually land first, at the close of the voyage 
across the Atlantic, at Liverpool, and there take a 



20 MARY QUEEK OF SCOTS. 

Mary was escorted from the island where 
she had been Hving, across the country to 
Dumbarton Castle, with a strong retinue. She 
was now between five and six years of age. 
She was, of course, too young to know any 
thing about the contentions and wars which 
had distracted her country on her account, or 
to feel much interest in the subject of her ap- 
proaching departure from her native land. 
She enjoyed the novelty of the scenes through 
which she passed on her journey. She was 
pleased with the dresses and the arms of the 
soldiers who accompanied her, and with the 
ships which were floating in the river, beneath 
the walls of the Castle of Dumbarton, when 

Glasgow steamer. Glasgow, which is the great commer- 
cial city of Scotland, is on the River Clyde. This river 
flows northwest to the sea. The steamer, in ascending the 
river, makes its way with difficulty along the narrow chan- 
nel, which, besides being narrow and tortuous, is obstructed 
by boats, ships, steamers, and every other variety of 
water-craft, such as are always going to and fro in the 
neighborhood of any great commercial emporium. 

The tourists, who stand upon the deck gazing at this 
exciting scene of life and motion, have their attention 
strongly attracted, about half way up the river, by this 
Castle of Dumbarton, which crowns a rocky hill, rising 
abruptly from the water's edge, on the north side of the 
stream. It attracts sometimes the more attention from 
American travelers, on account of its being the first an- 
cient castle they see. This is likely to be the case if they 
proceed to Scotland immediately on landing at Liverpool. 



MARY S CHILDHOOD. 



21 



she arrived there. She was pleased, too, to 
think that, wherever she was to go, her four 
Maries were to go with her. She bade her 




View from Mary's window, 
mother farewell, embarked on board the ship 
w^hich was to receive her, and sailed away 
from her native land, not to return to it again 
for many years. 




CHAPTER II, 

HER EDUCATION IN FRANCE. 

The departure of Mary from Scotland, little 
as she was, was a great event both for Scotland 
and for France. In those days kings and 
queens were even of greater relative importance 
than they are now, and all Scotland was in- 
terested in the young queen's going away from 
them, and all France in expecting her arrival. 
She sailed down the Clyde, and then passed 
along the seas and channels which lie between 
England and Ireland. These seas, though 
they look small upon the map, are really 
spacious and wide, and are often greatly agi- 
tated by winds and storms. This was the case 
at the time Mary made her voyage. The days 
and nights were tempestuous and wild, and 
the ships had difficulty in keeping in each 
other's company. There was danger of being 
blown upon the coasts, or upon the rocks or 
islands which lie in the way. Mary was too 
young to give much heed to these dangers, but t, 
the lords and commissioners, and the great 
ladies who went to attend her, were heartily 
22 



HER EDUCATIOK IN FRANCE. 23 

glad when the voyage was over. It ended 
safely at last, after several days of tossing 
upon the stormy billows, by their arrival upon 
the northern coast of France. They landed at 
a town called Brest. 

The King of France had made great prepara- 
tions for receiving the young queen immedi- 
ately upon her landing. Carriages and horses 
had been provided to convey herself and the 
company of her attendants, by easy journeys, 
to Paris. They received her with great pomp 
and ceremony at every town which she passed 
through. One mark of respect which they 
showed her was very singular. The king or- 
dered that every prison which she passed in 
her route should be thrown open, and the 
prisoners set free. This fact is a striking illus- 
tration of the different ideas which prevailed in 
those days, compared with those which are en- 
tertained now, in respect to crime and punish- 
ment. Crime is now considered as an offense 
against the community, and it would be con- 
sidered no faTor to the community, but the re- 
verse, to let imprisoned criminals go free. In 
those days, on the other hand, crimes were 
considered rather as injuries committed by the 
community, and against the king ; so that, if 
f the monarch wished to show the community 
a favor, he would do it by releasing such of 
them as had been imprisoned by his officers 



24 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

for their crimes. It was just so in the time 
of our Saviour, when the Jews had a custom of 
having some criminal released to them once a 
year, at the Passover, by the Roman govern- 
ment, as an act oi favor. That is, the govern- 
ment was accustomed to furnish, by way of 
contributing its share toward the general 
festivities of the occasion, the setting of a 
robber and a murderer at liberty ! 

The King of France has several palaces in 
the neighborhood of Paris. Mary was taken 
to one of them, named St. Germain. This 
palace, which still stands, is about twelve miles 
from Paris, toward the northwest. It is a very 
magnificent residence, and has been for many 
centuries a favorite resort of the French kings. 
Many of them ,vero born in it. There are ex- 
tensive parks an ' gardens onnected with it, 
and a great artificial lorest, in which the trees 
were all planted and cultivated like the trees 
of an orchard. Mary was received at this 
palace with great pomp and parade ; and many 
spectacles and festivities were arranged to 
amuse her and the four Maries who accom- 
panied her, and to impress her strongly with 
an idea of the wealth, and power, and splendor 
of the great country to which she had come. 

She remained here but a short time, and then 
it was arranged for her to go to a convent to be 
educated. Convents were in those days, as in 



HER EDUCATION IN FRANCE. 25 

fact they are now, quite famous as places of 
education. They were situated sometimes in 
large towns, and sometimes in secluded places 
in the country ; but. Whether in town or coun- 
try, the inmates of them were shut up very 
strictly from all intercourse with the world. 
They were under the care of nuns who had de- 
voted themselves for life to the service. These 
nuns were some of them unhappy persons, 
who were weary of the sorrows and sufferings 
of the world, and who were glad to retire from 
it to such a retreat as they fancied the con- 
vent would be. Others became nuns from con- 
scientious principles of duty, thinking that 
they should commend themselves to the favor 
of God by devoting their lives to works of be- 
nevolence and to the exercis'-s of religion. Of 
course there were all varieties of character 
among the nuns ; somj of them were selfish 
and disagreeable, others were benevolent and 
kind. 

At the convent where Mary was sent there 
were some nuns of very excellent and amiable 
character, and they took a great interest in 
Mary, both because she was a queen, and be- 
cause she was beautiful, and of a kind and 
affectionate disposition. Mary became very 
strongly attached to these nuns, and began to 
entertain the idea of becoming a nun herself, 
and spending her life with them in the con- 

3-Mary 



26 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

vent. It seemed pleasant to her to live there 
in such a peaceful seclusion, in company with 
those who loved her, and whom she herself 
loved ; but the King of France, and the Scot- 
tish nobles who had come with her from Scot- 
land, would, of course, be opposed to any such 
plan. They intended her to be married to the 
young prince, and to become one of the great 
ladies of the court, and to lead a life of magnifi- 
cence and splendor. They became alarmed, 
therefore, when they found that she was im- 
bibing a taste for the life of seclusion and soli- 
tude which is led by a nun. They decided to 
take her immediately away. 

Mary bade farewell to the convent and its 
inmates with much regret and many tears ; 
but, notwithstanding her reluctance, she was 
obliged to submit. If she had not been a queen, 
she might, perhaps, have had her own way. 
At it was, however, she was obliged to leave 
the convent and the nuns whom she loved, 
and to go back to the palaces of the king, in 
which she afterward continued to live, some- 
times in one and sometimes in another, for 
many years. Wherever she went, she was 
surrounded with scenes of great gaiety and 
splendor. They wished to obliterate from her 
mind all recollections of the convent, and all 
love of solitude and seclusion. They did not 
neglect her studies, but they filled up the in- 



HER EDUCATION IN FRANCE. 27 

tervals of study with all possible schemes of 
enjoyment and pleasure, to amuse and occupy 
her mind and the minds of her companions. 
Her companions were her own four Maries, 
and the two daughters of the French king. 

When Mary was about seven years of age, 
that is, after she had been two years in France, 
her mother formed a plan to come from Scot- 
land to see her. Her mother had remained 
behind when Mary left Scotland, as she had an 
important part to perform in public affairs, and 
in the administration of the government of Scot- 
land while Mary was away. She wanted, how- 
ever, to come and see her. France, too, was 
her own native land, and all her relations and 
friends resided there. SHe wished to see them 
as well as Mary, and to revisit once more the 
palaces and cities where her own early life had 
been spent. In speaking of Mary's mother we 
shall call her sometimes the queen dowager. 
The expression queen dowager is the one usu- 
ally applied to the widow of a king, as queen 
consort is used to denote the wife of a king. 

This visit of the queen dowager of Scotland 
to her little daughter in France was an event 
of great consequence, and all the arrangements 
for carrying it into effect were conducted with 
great pomp and ceremony. A large company 
attended her, with many of the Scottish lords 
and ladies among them. The King of France, 



28 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

too, went from Paris toward the French coast, 

to meet the party of visitors, taking little Mary 
and a large company of attendants with him. 
They went to Rouen, a large city not far from 
the coast, where they awaited the arrival of 
Mary's mother, and where they received her 
with great ceremonies of parade and rejoicing. 
The queen regent was very much delighted to 
see her little daughter again. She had grown 
two years older, and had improved greatly in 
every respect, and tears of joy came into her 
mother's eyes as she clasped her in her arms. 
The two parties journeyed in company to Paris, 
and entered the city with great rejoicings. The 
two queens, mother and daughter, were the ob- 
jects of universal interest and attention. Feasts 
and celebrations without end were arranged for 
them, and every possible means of amusement 
and rejoicing were contrived in the palaces of 
Paris, of St. Germain's, and of Fontainebleau. 
Mary's mother remained in France about a 
year. She then bade Mary farewell, leaving 
her at Fontainebleau. This proved to be a final 
farewell, for she never saw her again. 

After taking leave of her daughter, the queen 
dowager went, before leaving France, to see 
her own mother, who was a widow, and who 
was living at a considerable distance fromParis 
in seclusion, and in a state of austere and mel- 
ancholy grief, on account of the loss of her hus- 



HER EDUCATION IN FRANCE. 29 

band. Instead of forg-ettingf her sorrows, as she 
ought to have done, and returning calmly and 
peacefully to the duties and enjoyments of life, 
she had given herself up to inconsolable grief, 
and was doing all she could to perpetuate the 
mournful influence of her sorrows. She lived 
in an ancient and gloomy mansion, of vast size, 
and she had hung all the apartments in black, 
to make it still more desolate and gloomy, and 
to continue the influence of grief upon her mind. 
Here- the queen dowager found her, spending 
her time in prayers and austerities of every 
kind, making herself and all her family perfectly 
miserable. Many persons, at the present day 
act, under such circumstances, on the same prin- 
ciple and with the same spirit, though they do 
not do it perhaps in precisely the same way. 

One would suppose that Mary's mother would 
have preferred to remain in France with her 
daughter and her mother and all her family 
friends, instead of going back to Scotland, where 
she was, as it were, a foreigner and a stranger. 
The reason why she desired to go back was, 
that she wished to be made queen I'egent, and 
thus have tlie government of Scotland in her 
own hands. She would rather b,e queen regent 
in Scotland than a simple queen mother in 
France. While she was in France, she urged 
the king to use all his influence to have Arran 
resign his regency into her hands, and finally 



30 MARY QUEEK OF SCOTS. 

obtained writings from him and from Queen 
Mary to this effect. She then left France and 
went to Scotland, going through England on 
the way. The young King of England, to 
whom Mary had been engaged by the govern- 
ment when she was an infant in Janet Sinclair's 
arms, renewed his proposals to the queen 
dowager to let her daughter become his wife ; 
but she told him that it was all settled that she 
w^as to be married to the French prince, and 
that it was now too late to change the plan. 

There was a young gentleman, about nine- 
teen or twenty years of age, who cnme from 
Scotland also, not far from this time, to wait 
upon Mary as her page of honor. A page is 
an attendant above the rank of an ordinary 
servant whose business it is to wait upon his 
mistress, to read to her, sometimes to convey 
her letters and notes, and to carry her commands 
to the other attendants who are beneath him in 
rank, and whose business it is actually to per- 
form the services which the lady requires. A 
page of honor is a young gentleman who sus- 
tains this office in a nominal and temporary 
manner for a princess or a queen. 

The name of Mary's page of honor, who came 
to her now from Scotland, was Sir James Mel- 
ville. The only reason for mentioning him thus 
particularly, rather than the many other officers 
and attendants by whom Mary was surrounded 



HER EDUCATION IN FRANCE. 31 

was, that the service which he thus commenced 
was continued in various ways through the 
whole period of Mary's life. We shall often 
hear of him in the subsequent parts of this nar- 
rative. He followed Mary to Scotland when 
she returned to that country, and became after- 
ward her secretary, and also her ambassador on 
many occasions. He was now quite young, 
and when he landed at Brest he traveled slowly 
to Paris in the care of two Scotchmen, to whose 
charge he had been intrusted. He was a young 
man of uncommon talents and of great accom- 
plishments, and it was a mark of high distinc- 
tion for him to be appointed page of honor to 
the queen, although he was about nineteen 
years of age and she was, but seven. 

After the queen regent's return to Scotland, 
Mary went on improving in every respect more 
and more. She was diligent, industrious, and 
tractable. She took a great interest in her 
studies. She was not only beautiful in person, 
and amiable and affectionate in heart, but she 
possessed a very intelligent and active mind, 
and she entered with a sort of quiet but ear- 
nest enthusiasm into all the studies to which her 
attention was called. She paid a great deal of 
attention to music, to poetry, and to drawing. 
She used to invent little devices for seals, with 
French and Latin mottoes, and, after drawing 
them again and again with great care, until sh^ 



32 MAKY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

was satisfied with the design, she would give 
them to the gem-engravers to be cut upon stone 
seals, so that she could seal her letters with 
them. These mottoes and devices cannot 
well be represented in English, as the force and 
beauty of them depended generally upon a 
double meaning in some word of French or 
Latin, which cannot be preserved in the trans- 
lation. We shall, however, give one of these 
seals, which she made just before she left 
France, to return to Scotland, when we come 
to that period of her history. 

The King of France, and the lords and ladies 
who came with INIary from Scotland, contrived 
a great many festivals and celebrations in the 
parks, and forests, and palaces, to amuse the 
queen and the four Maries who were with her. 
The daughters of the French king joined, also, 
in these pleasures. They would have little 
balls, and parties, and picnics, sometimes in 
the open air, sometimes in the little summer- 
houses built upon the grounds attached to the 
palaces. The scenes of these festivities were 
in many cases made unusually joyous and gay 
by bonfires and illuminations. They had 
water parties on the little lakes, and hunt- 
ing parties through the parks and forests. 
Mary was a very graceful and beautiful rider, 
and full of courage. Sometimes she met with 
accidents which were attended with some 



HER EDtJCATlOK IN FRANCE. B8 

danger. Once, while hunting the stag, and 
riding at full speed with a great company of 
ladies and gentlemen behind her and before 
her, her dress got caught by the bough of a 
tree, and she was pulled to the ground. The 
horse went on. Several other riders drove by 
her without seeing her, as she had too much 
composure and fortitude to attract their atten- 
tion by outcries and lamentations. They saw 
her, however, at last, and came to her assist- 
ance. They brought back her horse, and 
smoothing down her hair, which had fallen 
into confusion, she mounted again, and rode 
on after the stag as before. 

Notwithstanding all these means of enjoy- 
ment and diversion, Mary was subjected to a 
great deal of restraint. The rules of etiquette 
are very precise and very strictly enforced in 
royal households, and they were still more 
strict in those days than they are now. The 
king was very ceremonious in all his arrange- 
ments, and was surrounded by a multitude 
of officers who performed everything by rule. 
As Mary grew older, she was subjected to 
greater and greater restraint. She used to 
spend a considerable portion of every day in 
the apartments of Queen Catharine, the wife 
of the King of France and the mother of the 
little Francis to whom she was to be married. 
Mary and Queen Catharine did not, however. 



34 MARY QUEEN OP SCOTS. 

like each other very well. Catharine was a 
woman of strong mind and of an imperious 
disposition ; and it is supposed by some that 
she was jealous of Mary because she was more 
beautiful and accomplished and more gener- 
ally beloved than her own daughters, the prin- 
cesses of France. At any rate, she treated 
Mary in rather a stern and haughty manner, 
and it was thought that she would finally op- 
pose her marriage to Francis her son. 

And yet Mary was at first very much pleased 
with Queen Catharine, and was accustomed 
to look up to her with great admiration, and 
to feel for her a very sincere regard. She often 
went into the queen's apartments, where they 
sat together and talked, or worked upon their 
embroidery, which was a famous amusement 
for ladies of exalted rank in those days. Mary 
herself at one time worked a large piece, which 
she sent as a present to the nuns in the con- 
vent where she had resided ; and afterward, in 
Scotland, she worked a great many things, 
some of which still remain, and maybe seen in 
her ancient rooms in the palace of Holyrood 
House.- She learned this art by working with 
Queen Catharine in her apartments. When 
she first became acquainted with Catharine on 
these occasions, she used to love her society. 
She admired her talents and her conversational 
powers, and she liked very much to be in her 



HER EDUCATION IN FRANCE. 35 

room. She listened to all she said, watched 
her movements, and endeavored in all things 
to follow her example. 

Catharine, however, thought that this was all 
a pretense, and that Mary did not really like her, 
but only wished to make her believe that she 
did so in order to get favor, or to accomplish 
some other selfish end. One day she asked 
her why she seemed to prefer her society to 
that of her youthful and more suitable com- 
panions. Mary replied, in substance, "The 
reason was, that though with them she might 
enjoy much, she could learn nothing ; while 
she always learned from Queen Catharine's 
conversation something, which would be of 
use to her as a guide in future life." One 
would have thought that this answer would 
have pleased the queen, but it did not. She 
did not believe that it was sincere. 

On one occasion INIary seriously offended 
the queen by a remark which she made, and 
which was, at least, incautious. Kings and 
queens, and, in fact, all great people in Europe, 
pride themselves very much upon the antiquity 
of the line from which they have descended. 
Now the family of Queen Catharine had risen 
to rank and distinction within a moderate 
period ; and though she was, as Queen of 
France, on the very pinnacle of human great- 
ness, she would naturally be vexed at any re- 



36 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

mark which would remind her of the recent- 
ness of her elevation. Now Mary at one time 
said, in conversation in the presence of Queen 
Catharine, that she herself was the descendant 
of a hundred kings. This was perhaps true, 
but it brought her into direct comparison with 
Catharine in a point in which the latter was 
greatly her inferior, and it vexed and mortified 
Catharine very much to have such a thing said 
to her by such a child. 

Mary associated thus during all this time, 
not only with the queen and the princesses, but 
also with the little prince whom she was des- 
tined to marry. His name was Francis, but 
he was commonly called the dauphin, which 
was the name by which the oldest son of the 
King of France was then, and has been since 
designated. The origin of this custom was this : 
About a hundred years before the time of which 
we are speaking, a certain nobleman of high 
rank, who possessed estates in an ancient prov- 
ince of France called Dauphiny, lost his son 
and heir. He was overwhelmed with affliction 
at the loss, and finally bequeathed all his es- 
tates to the king and his successors, on condi- 
tion that the oldest son should bear the title of 
Dauphin. The grant was accepted, and the 
oldest son was accordingly so styled from that 
time forward, from generation to generation. 

The dauphin, Francis, was a weak and fee- 




Mary, face p 



Mary, Queen of Scots. 



HER EDUCATION IN FRANCE. 37 

ble child, but he was amiable and gentle in his 
manners, and Mary liked him. She met him 
often in their walks and rides, and she danced 
with him at the balls and parties given for her 
amusement. She knew that he was to be her 
husband as soon as she was old enough to be 
married, and he knew that she was to be his 
wife. It was all decided, and nothing which 
either of them could say or do would have any 
influence on the result. Neither of them, how- 
ever, seem to have had any desire to change 
the result. Mary pitied Francis on account of 
his feeble health, and liked his amiable and 
gentle disposition ; and Francis could not help 
loving Mary, both on account of the traits of 
her character and her personal charms. 

As Mary advanced in years, she grew very 
beautiful. In some of the great processions 
and ceremonies, the ladies were accustomed 
to walk, magnificently dressed and carrying 
torches in their hands. In one of these pro- 
cessions Mary was moving along with the rest, 
through a crowd of spectators, and the light 
from her torch fell upon her features and upon 
her hair in such a manner as to make her ap- 
pear more beautiful than usual. A woman, 
standing there, pressed up nearer to her to 
view her more closely, and, seeing how beauti- 
ful she was, asked her if she was not an angel. 
In those d^ys, however, people believed in what 



38 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

is miraculous and supernatural more easily 
than now, so that it was not very surprising 
that one should think, in such a case, that an 
angel from Heaven had come down to join in 
the procession. 

Mary grew up a Catholic, of course : all 
were Catholics around her. The king and all 
the royal family were devoted to Catholic ob- 
servances. The convent, the ceremonies, the 
daily religious observances enjoined upon her, 
the splendid churches wliich she frequented, all 
tended in their influence to lead her mind away 
from the Protestant religion which prevailed in 
her native land, and to make her a Catholic : 
she remained so throughout her life. There is 
no doubt that she was conscientious in her at- 
tachment to the forms and to the spirit of the 
Roman Church. At any rate, she was faithful 
to the ties which her early education imposed 
upon her, and this fidelity became afterward 
the source of some of her heaviest calamities 
and woes. 




CHAPTER III. 



THE GREAT WEDDING. 



When Mary was about fifteen years of age, 
the King of France began to think that it was 
time for her to be married. It is true that she 
was still very young, but there were strong 
reasons for having the marriage take place at 
the earliest possible period, for fear that some- 
thing might occur to prevent its consumma- 
tion at all. In fact, there were very strong 
parties opposed to it altogether. The whole 
Protestant interest in Scotland were opposed 
to it, and were continually contriving plans to 
defeat it. They thought that if Mary married a 
French prince, who was, of course, a Catholic, 
she would become wedded to the Catholic in- 
terest hoplessly and forever. This made them 
feel a most bitter and determined opposition 
to the plan. 

In fact, so bitter and relentless were the ani- 
mosities that grew out of this question, that 
an attempt was actually made to poison Mary. 
The man who committed this crime was an 

4-Mary 39 



40 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

archer in the king's guard : he was a Scotch- 
man, and his name was Stewart. His attempt 
was discovered in time to prevent the accom- 
plishment of his purpose. He was tried and 
condemned. They made every effort to induce 
him to explain the reason which led him to 
such an act, or, if he was employed by others, 
to reveal their names ; but he would reveal 
nothing. He was executed for his crime, leav- 
ing mankind to conjecture that his motive, or 
that of the persons who instigated him to the 
deed, was a desperate determination to save 
Scotland, at all hazards, from falling under the 
influence of papal power. 

Mary's mother, the queen dowager of Scot- 
land, was of a celebrated French family, called 
the family of Guise. She is often, herself, called 
in history, Mary of Guise. There were other 
great families in France who were very jealous 
of the Guises, and envious of their influence and 
power. They opposed Queen Mary's marriage 
to the dauphin, and were ready to do all in 
their power to thwart and defeat it. Queen 
Catharine, too, who seemed to feel a greater 
and greater degree of envy and jealousy against 
Mary as she saw her in creasing in grace, beauty, 
and influence with her advancing years, was 
supposed to be averse to the marriage. Mary 
was, in some sense, her rival, and she could 
not bear to have her become the wife of her son, 



THE GREAT WEDDING. 41 

King Heny, finding all these opposing influ- 
ences at work, thought that the safest plan 
would be to have the marriage carried uito 
effect at the earUest possible period. When, 
therefore, Mary was about fifteen years of age, 
which was in 1557, he sent to Scotland, asking 
the government there to appoint some commis- 
sioners to come to France to assent to the 
marriage contracts, and to witness the cere- 
monies of the betrothment and the weddmg. 
The marriage contracts, in the case of the 
union of a queen of one country with a prince 
of another, are documents of very high impor- 
tance. It is considered necessary not only to 
make very formal provision for the personal 
welfare and comfort of the wife during her 
married life, and during her widowhood in 
case of the death of her husband, but also to 
settle beforehand the questions of succession 
which might arise out of the marriage, and to 
define precisely the rights and powers both of 
the husband and the wife in the two countries 
to which they respectively belong. 

The Parliament of Scotland appointed a num- 
ber of commissioners, of the highest rank and 
station, to proceed to France, and to act there 
as the representatives of Scotland in every- 
thing which pertained to the marriage. They 
Charged them to guard well the rights and pow- 
ers of Mary, to see that these rights and all the 



42 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

interests of Scotland were well protected in the 
marriage contracts, and to secure proper pro- 
vision for the personal comfort and happiness 
of the queen. The number of these commis- 
sioners was eight. Their departure from Scot- 
land was an event of great public importance. 
They were accompanied by a large number of 
attendants and followers, who were eager to 
be present in Paris at the marriage festivities. 
The whole company arrived safely at Paris, 
and were received with every possible mark of 
distinction and honor. 

The marriage contracts were drawn up, and 
executed with great formality. King Henry 
made no objection to any of the stipulations 
and provisions which the commissioners re- 
quired, for he had a secret plan for evading 
them all. Very ample provision was made for 
Mary herself. She was to have a very large 
income. In case the dauphin died while he 
was dauphin, leaving Mary a widow, she was 
still to have a large income paid to her by the 
French government as long as she lived, 
whether she remained in France or went back to 
Scotland. If her husband outlived his father, 
so as to become King of France, and then 
died, leaving Mary his widow, her income for 
the rest of her life was to be double what it 
would have been if he had died while dauphin. 
Francis was, in the mean time, to share with 



THE GREAT WEDDING. 43 

her the government of Scotland. If they had 
a son, he was to be, after their deaths, King of 
France and of Scotland too. Thus the two 
crowns would have been united. If, on the 
other hand, they had only daughters, the oldest 
one was to be Queen of Scotland only, as the 
laws of France did not allow a female to inherit 
the throne. In case they had no children, the 
crown of Scotland was not to come into the 
French family at all, but to descend regularly to 
the next Scotch heir. 

Henry was not satisfied with this entirely, 
for he wanted to secure the union of the Scotch 
and French crowns at all events, whether Mary 
had children or not ; and. he persuaded Mary 
to sign some papers with him privately, which 
he thought would secure his purposes, charg- 
ing her not to let the commissioners know that 
she had signed them. He thought it possible 
that he should never have occasion to produce 
them. One of these papers conveyed the 
crown of Scotland to the King of France abso- 
lutety and forever, in case Mary should die 
without children. Another provided that the 
Scotch government should repay him for the 
enormous sums he had expended upon Mary 
during her residence in France for her education, 
her attendants, the celebrations and galas which 
he had provided for her, and all the spendid jour- 
neys, processions, and parades. His motive 



44 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

in all this expense had been to unite the crown 
of Scotland to that of France, and he wished to 
provide that if anything should occur to pre- 
vent the execution of his plan, he could have 
all this money reimbursed to him again. He 
estimated the amount at a million of pieces of 
gold. This was an enormous sum : it shows on 
how magnificent a scale Mary's reception and 
entetainment in France w^ere managed. 

These preliminary proceedings being settled, 
all Paris, and, in fact, all France, began to pre- 
pare for the marriage celebrations. There 
were to be two great ceremonies connected 
with the occasion. The first was the betroth- 
ment, the second was the marriage. At the 
betrothment Francis and Mary w^ere to meet in 
a great public hall, and there, in the presence 
of a small and select assemblage of the lords 
and ladies of the court, and persons of distinc- 
tion connected with the royal family, they 
were formally and solemnly to engage them- 
selves to each other. Then, in about a week 
afterward, they were to be married, in the most 
■public manner, in the great Cathedral Church 
of Notre Dame. 

The ceremony of the betrothal was celebra- 
ted in the palace. The palace then occupied 
by the royal family was the Louvre. It still 
stands, but is no longer a royal dwelling. 
Another palace, more modern in its structure. 



THE GREAT WEDDING. 45 

and called the Tuilleries, has since been built, 
a little farther from the heart of the city, and 
in a more pleasant situation. The Louvre is 
square, with an open court in the center. This 
open court or area is very large, and is paved 
like the streets. In fact, two great carriage 
ways pass through it, crossing each other at right 
angles in the center, and passing out under 
great arch-ways in the four sides of the build- 
ing. There is a large hall within the palace, 
and in this hall the ceremony of the betrothal 
took place. Francis and Mary pledged their 
faith to each other with appropriate ceremonies. 
Only a select circle of relations and intimate 
friends were present on this occasion. The 
ceremony was concluded in the evening with 
a ball. 

In the mean time, all Paris was busy with 
preparations for the marriage. The Louvre is 
upon one side of the River Seine, its principal 
front being toward the river, with a broad 
street between. There are no buildings, but 
only a parapet wall on the river side of the 
street, so that there is a fine view of the river 
and of the bridges which cross it, from the pal- 
ace windows. Nearly opposite the Louvre is 
an island, covered with edifices, and con- 
nected, by means of bridges, with either shore. 
The great church of Notre Dame, where the. 
marriage ceremony was to be performed, is 



46 MARY QUEEN O^ SCOTS. 

upon this island. It has two enormous square 
towers in front, which may be seen, rising 
above all the roofs of the city, at a great dis- 
tance in every direction. Before the church is 
a large open area, where vast crowds assemble 
on any great occasion. The interior of the 
church impresses the mind with the sublimest 
emotions. Two rows of enormous columns 
rise to a great height on either hand, support- 
ing the lofty arches of the roof. The floor is 
paved with great flat stones, and resounds 
continually with the footsteps of visitors, who 
walk to and fro, up and down the aisles, look- 
ing at the chapels, the monuments, the sculp- 
tures, the paintings, and the antique and 
grotesque images and carvings. Colored 
light streams through the stained glass of the 
enormous windows, and the tones of the or- 
gan, and the voices of the priests, chanting the 
service of the mass, are almost always re- 
sounding and echoing from the vaulted roof 
above. 

The words No/re Dame mean Our Lady, an 
expression by which the Roman Catholics de- 
note Mary, the mother of Jesus. The church 
of Notre Dame had been for many centuries 
the vast cathedral church of Paris, w^here all 
great ceremonies of state were performed. On 
this occasion they erected a great amphitheater 
in the area before the church, which would 




Mwni,t<ui6p.tfi 



Church of Notre Dame. 



THE GREAT WEDBIKG. 47 

accommodate many thousands of the specta- 
tors who were to assemble, and enable them 
to see the procession. The bride and bride- 
groom, and their friends, were to assemble in 
the bishop's palace, which was near the Cathe- 
dral, and a covered gallery was erected, lead- 
ing from this palace to the church, through 
v.'hich the bridal party were to enter. They 
lined this gallery throughout with purple velvet 
and ornamented it in other ways, so as to 
make the approach to the church through it 
inconceivably splendid. 

Crowds began to collect in the great amphi- 
theater early in the morning. The streets 
leading to Notre Dame were thronged. Every 
window in all the lofty buildings around, and 
every balcony, was full. From ten to twelve 
the military bands began to arrive, and the 
long procession was formed, the different 
parties being dressed in various picturesque 
costumes. The ambassadors of various foreign 
potentates were present, each bearing their 
appropriate insignia. The legate of the Pope, 
magnificently dressed, had an attendant bear- 
ing before him a cross of massive gold. The 
bridegroom, Francis the dauphin, followed 
this legate, and soon afterward came Mary, 
accompanied by the king. She was dressed 
in white. Her robe was embroidered with the 
figure of the lily, and it glittered with diamonds 



48 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

and ornaments of silver. As was the custom 
in those days, her dress formed a long train, 
which was borne by two young girls who 
walked behind her. She wore a diamond neck- 
lace, with a ring of immense value suspended 
from it, and upon her head was a golden coro- 
net, enriched with diamonds and gems of 
inestimable value. 

But the dress and the diamonds which Mary 
wore were not the chief points of attraction to 
the spectators. All who w^ere present on the 
occasion ag-ree in saying that she looked inex- 
pressibly beautiful, and that there was an in- 
describable grace and charm in all her move- 
ments and manner, which filled all who saw 
her with an intoxication of delight. She was 
artless and unaffected in her manners, and her 
countenance, tlie expression of which was gen- 
erally placid and calm, was lighted up with 
the animation and interest of the occasion, so 
as to make everybody envy the dauphin- the 
possession of so beautiful a bride. Queen 
Catharine, and a long train of the ladies of the 
court, followed in the procession after Mary. 
Everybody thought that she felt envious and 
ill at ease. 

The essential thing in the marriage cere- 
mony was to be the putting of the wedding 
ring upon Mary's finger, and the pronouncing 
of the nuptial benediction which was im- 



THE GREAT WEDDING. 49 

mediately to follow it. This ceremony was 
to be performed by the Archbishop of Rouen, 
who was at that time the greatest ecclesiasti- 
cal dignitary in France. In order that as 
many persons as possible might witness this, 
it was arranged that it should be performed at 
the great door of the church, so as to be in 
view of the immense throng which had assem- 
bled in the amphitheater erected in the area, 
and of the multitudes which had taken their 
positions at the windows and balconies, and 
on the house-tops around. The possession, 
accordingly, having entered the church through 
the covered gallery, moved along the aisles and 
came to the great door. Here a royal pavilion 
had been erected, where the' bridal party could 
stand in view of the whole assembled multi- 
tude. King Henry had the ring. He gave it 
to the archbishop. The archbishop placed it 
upon INIary's finger, and pronounced the bene- 
diction in a loud voice. The usual congratu- 
lations followed, and Mary greeted her hus- 
band under the name of his majesty the King 
of Scotland. Then the whole mighty crowd 
rent the air with shouts and acclamations. 

It was the custom in those days, on such 
great public occasions as this, to scatter money 
among the crowd, that they might scramble 
for it. This was called the king's largess ; and 
the largess was pompously proclaimed by her- 



50 MAKY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

aids before the money was thrown. The throw, 
ing of the money among this immense throng 
produced a scene of indescribable confusion. 
The people precipitated themselves upon each 
other in their eagerness to seize the silver and 
the gold. Some were trampled under foot. 
Some were stripped of their hats and cloaks, or 
had their clothes torn from them. Some faint- 
ed, and were borne out of the scene with infi- 
nite difficulty and danger. At last the people 
clamorously begged the officers to desist from 
throwing any more money, for fear that the 
most serious and fatal consequence might 
ensue. 

In the mean time, the bridal procession re- 
turned into the church, and, advancing up the 
center between the lofty columns, they came 
to a place called the choir, which is in the 
heart of the church, and is inclosed by screens 
of carved and sculptured work. It is in the 
choir that congregations assemble to be present 
at mass and other religious ceremonies. Mova- 
ble seats are placed here on ordinary occasions, 
but at the time of this wedding the place was 
fitted up with great splendor. Here mass was 
performed in the presence of the bridal party. 
Mass is a solemn ceremony conducted by the 
priests, in which they renew, or think they re- 
new, the sacrifice ot Christ, accompanied with 
offerings of incense, and other acts of adora- 



THE GREAT WEDDING. 61 

tion, and the chanting of solemn hymns of 
praise. 

At the close of these services the procession 
moved again down the church, and, issuing 
forth at the great entrance, it passed around 
upon a specious platform, where it could be 
seen to advantage by all the spectators. Mary 
was the center to which all eyes were turned. 
She moved along, the very picture of grace 
and beauty, the two young girls who followed 
her bearing her train. The procession, after 
completing its circuit, returned to the church, 
and thence, through the covered gallery, it 
moved back to the bishop's palace. Here the 
company partook of a grand collation. After 
the collation there was a ball, but the ladies 
were too much embarrassed with their magnifi- 
cent dresses to be able to dance, and at five 
o'clock the royal family returned to their home. 
Mary and Queen Catharine went together in a 
sort of palanquin, borne by men, high officers 
of state walking on each side. The king and 
the dauphin followed on horseback, with a 
large company in their train ; but the streets 
were everywhere so crowded with eager spec- 
tators that it was with extreme difficulty that 
they were able to make their way. 

The palace to which the party went to spend 
the evening was fitted up and illuminated in 
the most splendid manner, and a variety of 



52 MAKY QUEEN OE SCOTS. 

most curious entertainments had been con- 
trived for the amusement of the company. 
There were twelve artificial horses, made to 
move by niternal mechanism, and splendidly 
caparisoned. The children of the company, 
the little princes and dukes, mounted these 
horses and rode arouiid the arena. Then came 
in a company of men dressed like pilgrims, 
each of whom recited a poem written in honor 
of the occasion. After this was an cxhib .on 
of galleys, or boats, upon a little sea. Tnese 
boats were large enough to bear up two persons. 
There were two seats in each, one of wliich 
was occupied by a young gentleman. As the 
boats advanced, one by one, each gentleman 
leaped to the shore, or to what represented the 
shore, and, going among the company, selected 
a lady and bore her off to his boat, and then, 
seating her in the vacant chair, took his place 
by her side, and continued his voyage. 
Francis was in one of the boats, and he, on 
coming to the shore, took Mary for his com- 
panion. 

The celebrations and festivities of this famous 
wedding continued for fifteen days. They 
closed with a grand tournament. A tourna- 
ment was a very magnificent spectacle in those 
days. A field was inclosed, in which kings, 
and princes, and knights, fully armed, and 
mounted on war-horses, tilted against each 



THE GREAT WEDDING. 5B 

other with lances and blunted swords. Ladies 
of high rank were present' as spectators and 
judges, and one was appointed at each tourna- 
ment to preside, and to distribute the honors 
and rewards to those who were most succcsslul 
in the contests. The greatest possible degree 
of deference and honor was paid to the ladies 
by all the knights on these occasions. Once, 
at a. tournament in London, arranged by a king 
of 'I'ngland, the knights and noblemen rode in 
a long procession to the field, each led by a 
lady by means of a silver chain. It was a 
great honor to be admitted to a share in these 
contests, as none but persons of the highest 
rank were allowed to take a part in them. 
Whenever one was to be held, invitations were 
sent to all the courts of Europe, and kings, 
queens, and sovereign princes came to witness 
the spectacle. 

The horsemen who contended on these occa- 
sions carried long lances, blunt, indeed, at the 
end, so that they could not penetrate the armor 
of the antagonist at which they were aimed, 
but yet of such weight that the momentum of 
the blow was sometimes sufficient to unhorse 
him. The great object of every combatant 
was, accordingly, to protect himself from 
this danger. He must turn his horse suddenly, 
and avoid the lance of his antagonist ; or he 
must strike it with his own, and thus parry the 

5-M»ry 



54 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

blow ; or if he must encounter it, he was to 
brace himself firmly in his saddle, and resist 
its impulse with all the strength that he 
could command. It required, therefore, great 
strength and great dexterity to excel in a 
tournament. In fact, the rapidity of the 
evolutions which it required gave origin to 
the name, the word tournament being formed 
from a French word* which signifies to turn. 

The princes and noblemen who were pres- 
ent at the wedding all joined in the tourna- 
ment except the poor bridegroom, who was 
too weak and feeble in body, and too timid in 
mind, for any such rough and warlike exer- 
cises. Francis was very plain and unpre- 
possessing in countenance, and shy and awk- 
ward in his manners. His health had always 
been very infirm, and though his rank was very 
high, as he was the heir apparent to what was 
then the greatest throne in Europe, every- 
body thought that in all other respects he was 
unfit to be the husband of such a beautiful 
and accomplished princess as Mary. He was 
timid, shy, and anxious and unhappy in dis- 
position. He knew that the gay and warlike 
spirits around him could not look upon him 
with respect, and he felt a painful sense of his 
inferiority. 

Mary, however, loved him. It was a love, 

* Tourner. 




Mary, face p 5i 

Mary and her Young Husband, Francis 11. 



THE GREAT WEDDING. 56 

perhaps, mingled with pity. She did not as- 
sume an air of superiority over him, but en- 
deavored to encourage .him, to lead him for- 
vi^ard, to inspire him with confidence and hope, 
and to malv'e him feel his own strength and 
value. She was herself of a sedate and 
thouo:htful character, and w'ith all her Intel- 
lectual superiority, she was characterized by 
that feminine gentleness of spirit, that dis- 
position to follow and to yield rather than to 
govern, that desire to be led and to be loved 
rather than to lead and be admired, which 
constitute the highest charm of woman. 

Francis was glad when the celebrations, 
tournament and all, were well over. He set 
off from Paris with his yoifng bride to one of his 
country residences, where he could live, for a 
while, in peace and quietness. Mary was re- 
leased, in some degree, from the restraints, 
and formalities, and rules of etiquette of King 
Henry's court, and was, to some extent, her 
own mistress, though still surrounded with 
many attendants, and much parade and 
splendor. The young couple thus com- 
menced the short period of their married 
life. They were certainly a very young 
couple, being both of them under sixteen. 

The rejoicings on account of the marriage 
were not confined to Paris. All Scotland cele- 
brated the event with much parade. The 



66 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

Catholic party there were pleased with the 
final consummation of the event, and all the 
people, in fact, joined, more or less, in com- 
memorating the marriage of their queen. 
There is in the Castle of Edinburgh, on a lofty 
platform which overlooks a broad valley, a 
monstrous gun, several centuries old, which 
was formed of bars of iron secured by great 
iron hoops. The balls which this gun carried 
are more than a foot in diameter. The name 
of this enormous piece of ordnance is Mons 
Meg. It is now disabled, having been burst, 
many years ago, and injured beyond the 
possibility of repair. There were great re- 
joicings in Edinburgh at the time of Mary's 
marriage, and from some old accounts which 
still remain at the castle, it appears that ten 
shillings were paid to some men for moving 
up Mons Meg to the embrasure of the battery, 
and for finding and bringing back her shot 
after she was discharged ; by which it appears 
that firing Mons Meg was a part of the 
celebration by which the people of Edinburgh 
honored the marriage of their queen. 




CHAPTER IV. 

MISFORTUNES. 

It was said in the last chapter that Mary- 
loved her husband, infirm and feeble as he was 
both in body and in mind. This love was 
probably the effect, quite as much as it was 
the cause, of the kindness which she showed 
him. As we are very apt to hate those whom 
we have injured, so we almost instinctively 
love those who have in any w^ay become the 
objects of our kindness and care. If any wife, 
therefore, wishes for the pleasure of loving her 
husband, or which is, perhaps, a better sup- 
position, if any husband desires the happiness 
of loving his wife, conscious that it is a pleas- 
ure which he does not now enjoy, let him 
commence by making her the object of his 
kind attentions and care, and love will spring 
up in the heart as a consequence of the kind 
of action of which it is more commonly the 
cause. 

About a year passed away, when at length 
another great celebration took place in Paris, 

57 



58 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

to honor the marriages of some other members 
of King Henry's family. One of them was 
Francis's oldest sister. A grand tournament 
was arranged on this occasion too. The 
place for this tournament was where the great 
street of St. Antoine now lies, and which may 
be found on any map of Paris. A very large 
concourse of kings and nobles from all the 
courts of Europe were present. Kmg Henry, 
magnificently dressed, and mounted on a su- 
perb war-horse, was a very prominent figure 
in all the parades of the occasion, though the 
actual contests and trials of skill which took 
place were between younger princes and 
knights, King Henry and the ladies being 
generally only spectators and judges. He, 
however, took a part himself on one or two 
occasions, and received great applause. 

At last, at the end of the third day, just as 
the tournament was to be closed. King Henry 
was riding around the field, greatly excited 
with the pride and pleasure which so mag- 
nificent a spectacle was calculated to awaken, 
when he saw two lances still remaining which 
had not been broken. The idea immediately 
seized him of making one more exhibition of 
his own power and dexterity in such contests. 
He took one of the lances, and, directing a 
high officer who was riding near him to take 
the other, he challenged him to a trial of skill, 



MISFORTUNES. 59 

The name of this officer was Montgomery. 
Montgomery at first declined, being unwilling 
to contend with his king. The king insisted. 
Queen Catharine begged that he would not 
contend again. Accidents sometimes hap- 
pened, she knew, in these rough encounters ; 
and, at any rate, it terrified her to see her 
husband exposed to such dangers. The other 
lords and ladies, and Francis and Queen Mary 
particularly, joined in these expostulations. 
Bui Henry was inflexible. There was no 
danger, and, smiling at their fears, he com- 
manded Montgomery to arm himself with his 
lance and take his position. 

The spectators looked- on in breathless si- 
lence. The two horsemen rode toward each 
other, each pressing his horse forward to his 
utmost speed, and as they passed, each aimed 
his lance at the head and breast of the other. 
It was customary on such occasions to wear 
a helmet, with a part called a vizor in front, 
which could be raised on ordinary occasions, 
or let down in moments of danger like this, 
to cover and protect the eyes. Of course this 
part of the armor was weaker than the rest, 
and it happened that Montgomery's lance 
struck here — was shivered — and a jplinter of 
it penetrated the vizor and inflicted a wound 
upon Henry, on the head, just over the eye. 
Henry's horse went on. The spectators ob- 



60 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

served that the rider reeled and trembled in 
his seat. The whole assembly were in con- 
sternation. The excitement of pride and pleas- 
nre was everywhere turned into extreme anx- 
iety and alarm. 

They flocked about Henry's horse, and 
helped the king to dismount. He said it was 
nothing. They took off his helmet, and found 
large drops of blood issuing from the wound. 
They bore him to his palace. He had the 
magnanimity to say that Montgomery must 
not be blamed for this result, as he was him- 
self responsible for it entirely. He lingered 
eleven days, and then died. This was in July, 
1559. 

One of the marriages which this unfortunate 
tournament had been intended to celebrate 
that of Elizabeth, the king's daughter, had 
already taken place, having been performed a 
day or two before the king was wounded ; and 
it was decided, after Henry was wounded, 
that the other must proceed, as there were 
great reasons of state against any postpone- 
ment of it. This second marriage was that of 
Margaret, his sister. The ceremony in her 
case was performed in a silent and private 
manner, at night, by torchlight, in the chapel 
of the palace, while her brother was dying. 
The services were interrupted by her sobs and 
tears. 



MISFOKTUNES. 61 

Notwithstanding the mental and bodily fee- 
bleness which seemed to characterize the 
dauphin, Mary's husband, who now, by the 
death of .his father, became King of France, the 
event of his accession to the throne seemed to 
awaken his energies, and arouse him to anima- 
tion and effort. He was sick himself, and in 
his bed, in a palace called the Tournelles, 
when some officers of state were ushered into 
his apartment, and, kneeling before him, sa- 
luted him as king. This was the first an- 
nouncement of his father's death. He sprang 
from his bed, exclaiming at once that he was 
well. It is one of the sad consequences of he- 
reditary greatness and power that a son must 
sometimes rejoice at the death of his father. 

It was Francis's duty to repair at once to 
the royal palace of the Louvre, with Mary, who 
was now Queen of France as well as of Scot- 
land, to receive the homage of the various es- 
tates of the realm. Catharine was, of course, 
now queen dowager. Mary, the child whom 
she had so long looked upon with feelings of 
jealousy and envy was, from this time, to take 
her place as queen. It was very humiliating 
to Catharine to assume the position of a second 
and an inferior in the presence of one whom 
she had so long been accustomed to direct and 
to command. She yielded, however, with a 
good grace, though she seemed dejected and 



62 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

sad. As they were leaving the Tournelles, she 
stopped to let Mary go before her, saying, 
**Pass on, madame ; it is your turn to take 
precedence now." Mary went before her, but 
she stopped in her turn, with a sweetness of 
disposition so characteristic of her, to let Queen 
Catharine enter first into the carriage which 
awaited them at the door. 

Francis, though only sixteen, was entitled to 
assume the government himself. He went to 
Rheims, a town northeast of Paris, where is an 
abbey, which is the ancient place of coronation 
for the kings of France. Here he was crowned. 
He appointed his ministers, and evinced, in 
his management and in his measures, more 
energy and decision than it was supposed he 
possessed. He himself and Mary were now, 
together, on the summit of earthly grandeur. 
They had many political troubles and cares 
which cannot be related here, but Mary's life 
was comparatively peaceful and happy, the 
pleasures which she enjoyed being greatly en- 
hanced by the mutual affection which existed 
between herself and her husband. 

Though he was small in stature, and very 
unprepossessing in appearance and manners, 
Francis still evinced in his government a con- 
siderable degree of good judgment and of 
energy. His health, however, gradually de- 
clined. He spent much of his time in travel- 



MISFORTUNES. 63 

ing, and was often dejected and depressed. 
One circumstance made him feel very unhappy. 
The people of many of the villages through 
which he passed, being in those days very 
ignorant and superstitious, got a rumor into 
circulation that the king's malady was such 
that he could only be cured by being bathed 
in the blood of young children. They im- 
agined that he was traveling to obtain such a 
bath ; and, wherever he came, the people fled, 
mothers eagerly carrying off their children 
from this impending danger. The king did 
not understand the cause of his being thus 
shunned. They concealed it from him, know- 
ing that it would give him pain. He knew 
only the fad, and it made him very sad to 
find himself the object of this mysterious and 
unaccountable aversion. 

In the mean time, while these occurrences 
had been taking place in France, Mary's 
mother, the queen dowager of Scotland, had 
been made queen regent of Scotland after her 
return from France ; but she experienced in- 
finite trouble and difficulty in managing the 
affairs of the country. The Protestant party 
became very strong, and took up arms against 
her government. The English sent them aid. 
She, on the other hand, with the Catholic 
interest to support her, defended her power 
as well as she could, and called for help from 



64 MARY QUEEN OP SCOTS. 

France to sustain her. And thus the country 
which she was so ambitious to g-overn, was 
involved by her management in the calamities 
and sorrows of civil war. 

In the midst of this contest she died. Dur- 
ing- her last sickness she sent for some of the 
leaders of the Protestant party, and did all 
that she could to soothe and conciliate their 
minds. She mourned the calamities and suffer- 
ings which the civil war had brought upon the 
country, and urged the Protestants to do all 
in their power, after her death, to heal these 
dissensions and restore peace. She also ex- 
horted them to remember their obligations of 
loyalty and obedience to their absent queen, 
and to sustain and strengthen her government 
by every means in their power. She died, and 
after her death the war was brought to a close 
by a treaty of peace, in which the French and 
English governments joined with the govern- 
ment of Scotland to settle the points in dispute, 
and immediately afterward the troops of both 
these nations were withdrawn. The death of 
the queen regent was supposed to have been 
caused by the pressure of anxiety which the 
cares of her government imposed. Her body 
was carried home to France, and interred in 
the royal abbey at Rheims. 

The death of Mary's mother took place in 
the summer of 1560. The next December 



MISFORTUNES. 65 

Mary was destined to meet with a much 
heavier affliction. Her husband, King Francis, 
in addition to other complaints, had been suf- 
fering for some time from pain and disease in 
the ear. One day, when he was preparing to 
go out hunting, he was suddenly seized with 
a fainting fit, and was soon found to be in 
great danger. He continued some days very 
ill. He was convinced himself that he could 
not recover, and began to make arrangements 
for his approaching end. As he drew near to 
the close of his life, he was more and more 
deeply impressed with a sense of Mary's kind- 
ness and love. He mourned very much his 
approaching separation from her. He sent for 
his mother. Queen Catharine, to come to his 
bedside, and begged that she would treat Mary 
kindly, for his sake, after he was gone. 

Mary was overwhelmed with grief at the 
approaching death of her husband. She knew 
at once what a great change it would make in 
her condition. She would lose immediately 
her rank and station. Queen Catharine would 
again come into power, as queen regent, dur- 
ing the minority of the next heir. All her 
friends of the family of Guise, would be re- 
moved from office, and she herself would be- 
come a mere guest and stranger in the land of 
which she had been the queen. But nothing 
could arrest the progress of the disease under 



66 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

which her husband was sinking. He died, 
leaving Mary a disconsolate widow of seven- 
teen. 

The historians of those days say that Queen 
Catharine was much pleased at the death of 
Francis her son. It restored her to rank and 
power. Mary was again beneath her, and in 
some degree subject to her will. All Mary's 
friends were removed from their high stations, 
and others, hostile to her family, were put into 
their places. Mary soon found herself unhappy 
at court, and she accordingly removed to a 
castle at a considerable distance from Paris to 
the west, near the city of Orleans. The people 
of Scotland wished her to return to her native 
land. Both the great parties sent ambassadors 
to her to ask her to return, each of them urg- 
ing her to adopt such measures on her arrival 
in Scotland as should favor their cause. 
Queen Catharine, too, who was still jealous 
of Mary's influence, and of the admiration and 
love which her beauty and the loveliness of 
her character inspired, intimated to her that 
perhaps it would be better for her now to leave 
France and return to her own land. 

Mary was very unwilling to go. She loved 
France. She knew very little of Scotland. 
She was very young when she left it, and the 
few recollections which she had of the country 
were confined to the lonely island of Inchma- 



MISFORTUNES. 67 

home and the Castle of Stirling. Scotland was 
in a cold and inhospitable climate, accessible 
only through stormy and dangerous seas, and 
it seemed to her that going there was going 
into exile. Besides, she dreaded to undertake 
personally to administer a government whose 
cares and anxieties had been so great as to 
carry her mother to the grave. 

Mary, however, found that it was in vain 
for her to resist the influences which pressed 
upon her the necessity of returning to her 
native land. She wandered about during the 
spring and summer after her husband's death, 
spending her time in various palaces and 
abbeys, and at length she began to prepare for 
her return to Scotland. -The same gentleness 
and loveliness of character which she had ex- 
hibited in her prosperous fortunes, shone still 
more conspicuously now in her hours of sor- 
row. Sometimes she appeared in public, in 
certain ceremonies of state. She was then 
dressed in mourning — in white — according to 
the custom in royal families in those days, her 
dark hair covered by a delicate crape veil. 
Her beauty, softened and chastened by her 
sorrows, made a strong impression upon all 
who saw her. 

She appeared so frequently, and attracted so 
much attention in her white mourning, that 
she began to be known among the people as 

6-Mary 



68 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

the White Queen. Everybody wanted to see 
her. They admired her beauty ; they were im- 
pressed with the romantic interest of her his- 
tory ; they pitied her sorrows. She mourned 
her husband's death with deep and unaffected 
grief. She invented a device and motto for a 
seal, appropriate to the occasion : it was a 
figure of the liquorice-tree, every part of which 
is useless except the root, which of course, lies 
beneath the surface of the earth. Underneath 
was the inscription, in Latin, My treasure is in 
the ground. The expression is much more 
beautiful in the Latin than can be expressed in 
any English words.* 

Mary did not, however, give herself up to 
sullen and idle grief, but employed herself in 
various studies and pursuits, in order to soothe 
and solace her grief by useful occupation. 
She read Latin authors ; she studied poetry ; 
she composed. She paid much attention to 
music, and charmed those who were in her 
company by the sweet tones of her voice and 
her skilful performance upon an instrument. 
The historians even record a description of the 
fascinating effect produced by the graceful 
movements of her beautiful hand. Whatever 
she did or said seemed to carry with it an in- 
expressible charm. 

Before she set out on her return to Scotland, 

♦ Dulce meum terra tcgit. 



MISFORTUNES. 



69 



she went to pay a visit to her grandmother, 
the same lady whom her mother had gone to 
see in her castle, ten years before, on her 
return to Scotland after her visit to Mary. 
During this ten years the unhappy mourner 
had made no change in respect to her symbols 
of grief. The apartments of her palace were 
still hung with black. Her countenance wore 
the same expression of austerity and wo. 
Her attendants were trained to pay to her 
every mark of the most profound deference in 
all their approaches to her. No sounds of 
gaiety or pleasure were to be heard, but a 
profound stillness and solemnity reigned con- 
tinually throughout the gloomy mansion. 

Not long before the arrangements were 
completed for Mary's return to Scotland, she 
revisited Paris, where she was received with 
great marks of attention and honor. She was 
now eighteen or nineteen years of age, in the 
bloom of her beauty, and the monarch of a 
powerful kingdom, to which she was about to 
return, and many of the young princes of 
Europe began to aspire to the honor of her 
hand. Through these and other influences, 
she was the object of much attention ; while, 
on the other hand. Queen Catharine, and the 
party in power at the French court, were en- 
vious and jealous of her popularity, and did a 
great deal to mortify and vex her. 



rO MARY QUEEK OF SCOtS. 

The enemy, however, whom Mary had most 
to fear, was her cousin, Queen Elizabeth of 
England. Queen Elizabeth was a maiden 
lady, now nearly thirty years of age. She 
was in all respects extremely different from 
Mary. She was a zealous Protestant, and 
very suspicious and watchful in respect to 
Mary, on account of her Catholic connections 
and faith. She was very plain in person, and 
unprepossessing in manners. She was, how- 
ever, intelligent and shrewd, and was governed 
by calculations and policy in all that she did. 
The people by whom she was, surrounded ad- 
mired her talents and feared her power, but 
nobody loved her. She had many good qua- 
lities as a monarch, but none considered as a 
woman. 

Elizabeth was somewhat envious of her 
cousin Mary's beauty, and of her being such 
an object of interest and affection to all who 
knew her. But she had a far more serious and 
permanent cause of alienation from her than 
personal envy. It was this : Elizabeth's father. 
King Henry VIII., had, in succession, several 
wives, and there had been a question raised 
about the legality of his marriage with Eliza- 
beth's mother. Parliament decided at one 
time that this marriage was not valid ; at an- 
other time, subsequently, they decided that it 
was. This difference in the two decisions was 



MISFORTUNES. 71 

not owingi»so much to a change of sentiment 
in the persons who voted, as to a change in 
the ascendency of the parties by which the 
decision was controlled. If the marriage were 
valid, then Elizabeth was entitled to the Eng- 
lish crown. Is it were not valid, then she was 
not entitled to it : it belonged to the next heir. 
Now it happened that Mary Queen of Scots 
was the next heir. Her grandmother on the 
father's side was an English princess, and 
through her Mary had a just title to the crown, 
if Queen Elizabeth's title was annulled. 

Now, while Mary was in France, during the 
lifetime of King Henry, Francis's father, he 
and the members of the family of Guise ad- 
vanced Mary's claim to the British crown, and 
denied that of Elizabeth. They made a coat 
of arms, in which the arms of France, and 
Scotland, and England were combined, and 
had it engraved on Mary's silver plate. On 
one great occasion, they had this symbol dis- 
played conspicuously over the gateway of a 
town where Mary was making a public entry. 
The English ambassador, who was present, 
made this, and the other acts of the same kind, 
known to Elizabeth, and she was greatly in- 
censed at them. She considered Mary as 
plotting treasonably against her power, and 
began to contrive plans to circumvent and 
thwart her. 



72 MAUY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

Nor was Elizabeth wholly unreasonable in 
this. Mary, though personally a gentle and 
peaceful woman, yet in her teens, was very 
formidable to Elizabeth as an opposing claim- 
ant of the crown. All the Catholics in France 
and in Scotland would naturally take Mary's 
side. Then, besides this, there was a large 
Catholic party in England, who would be 
strongly disposed to favor any plan which 
should give them a Catholic monarch. Eliza- 
beth was, therefore, very justly alarmed at 
such a claim on the part of her cousin. It 
threatened not only to expose her to the ag- 
gressions of foreign foes, but also to internal 
commotions and dangers, in her own do- 
minions. 

The chief responsibility for bringing forward 
this claim must rest undoubtedly, not on Mary 
herself, but on King Henry of France and the 
other French princes, who first put it forward. 
Mary, however, herself, was not entirely pas- 
sive in the affair. She liked to consider her- 
self as entitled to the English crown. She had 
a device for a seal, a very favorite one with 
her, which expressed this claim. It contained 
two crowns, with a motto in Latin below 
which meant, *' A third awaits me.*' Elizabeth 
knew all these things, and she held Mary ac- 
countable for all the anxiety and alarm which 
this dangerous claim occasioned her. 



MISFORTUNES. 73 

At the peace which was made in Scotland 
between the French and English forces and the 
Scotch, by the great treaty of Edinburgh which 
has been already described, it was agreed that 
Mary should relinquish all claim to the crown 
of England. This treaty was brought to France 
for Mary to ratify it, but she declined. What- 
ever rights she might have to the English 
crown, she refused to surrender them. Things 
remained in this state until the time arrived 
for her return to her native land, and then, 
fearing that perhaps Elizabeth might do some- 
thing to intercept her passage, she applied to 
her for a safe-conduct ; that is, a writing au- 
thorizing her to pass safely and without hinder- 
ance through the English dominions, whether 
land or sea. Queen Elizabeth returned word 
through her ambassador in Paris, whose name 
was Throckmorton, that she could not give 
her any such safe-conduct, because she had 
refused to ratify the treaty of Edinburgh. 

When this answer was communicated to 
Mary, she felt deeply wounded by it. She 
sent all the attendants away, that she might 
express herself to Throckmorton without re- 
serve. She told him that it seemed to her 
very hard that her cousin was disposed to pre- 
vent her return to her native land. As to her 
claim upon the English crown, she said that 
advancing it was not her plan, but that of her 



74 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

husband and his father ; and that now she 
could not properly renounce it, whatever its 
validity might be, till she could have oppor- 
tunity to return to Scotland and consult with 
her government there, since it affected not her 
personally alone, but the public interests of 
Scotland. "And now, "she continued, in sub- 
stance, " I am sorry that I asked such a favor 
of her. I have no need to ask it, for I am sure 
I have a right to return from France to my 
own country without asking permission of any 
one. You have often told me that the queen 
wished to be on friendly terms with me, and 
that it was your opinion that to be friends 
would be best for us both. But now I see that 
she is not of your mind, but is disposed to 
treat me in an unkind and unfriendly manner, 
while she knows that I am her equal in rank, 
though I do not pretend to be her equal in 
abilities and experience. Well, she may do as 
she pleases. If my preparations were not so 
far advanced, perhaps I should give up the 
voyage. But I am resolved to go. I hope 
the winds will prove favorable, and carry me 
away from her shores. If they carry me upon 
them, and I fall into her hands, she may make 
what disposal of me she will. If I lose my 
life, I shall esteem it no great loss, for it is now 
little else than a burden." 

How strongly this speech expresses "that 



MISFORTUNES. 75 

mixture of melancholy and dignity, of woman- 
ly softness and noble decision, which pervaded 
her chracter." There is a sort of gentleness 
even in her anger, and a certain indescribable 
womanly charm in the workings of her mind, 
which cause all who read her story, while 
they cannot but think that Elizabeth was right, 
to sympathize wholly with Mary. 

Throckmorton, at one of his conversations 
with Mary, took occasion to ask her respect- 
ing her religious views, as Elizabeth wished to 
know how far she was fixed and committed in 
her attachment to the Catholic faith. Mary 
said that she was born and had been brought 
up a Catholic, and that she should remain so 
as long as she lived. She would not interfere, 
she said, with her subjects adopting such form 
of religion as they might prefer, but for herself 
she should not change. If she should change, 
she said, she should justly lose the confidence 
of her people ; for, if they saw that she was 
light and fickle on that subject, they could not 
rely upon her in respect to any other. She 
did not profess to be able to argue, herself, the 
questions of difference, but she was not wholly 
uninformed in respect to them, as she had 
often heard the points discussed by learned 
men, and had found nothing to lead her to 
change her ground. 

It is impossible for any reader, whether 



76 



MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 



Protestant or Catholic, not to admire the frank- 
ness and candor, the honest conscientiousness, 




Queen Elizabeth, 
the courage, and, at the same time, womanly 
modesty and propriety which characterize this 
reply. 




CHAPTER V. 

RETURN TO SCOTLAND. 

Mary was to sail from the port of Calais. 
Calais is on the northern coast of France, op- 
posit to Dover in England, these towns being 
on opposite sides of the Straits of Dover, where 
the channel between England and France is 
very narrow. Still, the distance is so great 
that the land on either side is ordinarily not 
visible on the other. There is no good natural 
harbor at Calais, nor, in fact, at any other 
point on the French coast. The French have 
had to supply the deficiency by artificial piers 
and breakwaters. There are several very ca- 
pacious and excellent harbors on the English 
side. This may have been one cause, among 
others, of the great naval superiority which 
England has attained. 

When Queen Elizabeth found that Mary 
was going to persevere in her intention of re- 
turning to her native land, she feared that she 
might, after her arrival in Scotland, and after 
getting established in power there, form a 

77 



78 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

scheme for making war upon her dominions, 
and attempt to carry into effect her claim upon 
the English crown. She wished to prevent 
this. Would it be prudent to intercept Mary 
upon her passage .? She reflected on this sub- 
ject with the cautious calculation which formed 
so striking a part of her character, and felt in 
doubt. Her taking Mary a prisoner, and con- 
fining her a captive in her own land, might 
incense Queen Catharine, who was now regent 
of France, and also awaken a general resent- 
ment in Scotland, so as to bring upon her the 
hostility of those two countries, and thus, 
perhaps, make more mischief than the securing 
of Mary's person would prevent. 

She accordingly, as a previous step, sent to 
Throckmorton, her ambassador in France, di- 
recting him to have an interview with Queen 
Catharine, and ascertain how far she would 
feel disposed to take Mary's part. Throck- 
morton did this. Queen Catharine gave no 
direct reply. She said that both herself and 
the young king wished well to Elizabeth, and 
to Mary too ; that it was her desire that the 
two queens might be on good terms with each 
other ; that she was a friend to them both, and 
should not take a part against either of them. 

This was all that Queen Elizabeth could ex- 
pect, and she formed her plans for intercepting 
Mary on her passage, She sent to Throck- 



RETTJRN TO SCOTLAND. 79 

morton, asking him to find out, if he could, 
what port Queen Mary was to sail from, and 
to send her word. She then gave orders to her 
naval commanders to assemble as many ships 
as they could, and hold them in readiness to sail 
into the seas between England and France, for 
the purpose of exterminating the pirates^ which 
she said had lately become very numerous 
there. 

Throckmorton took occasion, in a conversa- 
tion which he had with Mary soon after this, 
to inquire from what port she intended to sail ; 
but she did not give him the information. She 
suspected his motive, and merely said, in re- 
ply to his question, that she hoped the wind 
would prove favorable for carrying her away 
as far as possible from the English coast, what- 
ever might be the point from which she should 
take her departure. Throckmorton then en- 
deavored to find out the arrangements of the 
voyage by other means, but without much 
success. He wrote to Elizabeth that he 
thought Mary would sail either from Havre or 
Calais; that she would go eastward, along the 
shore of the Continent, by Flanders~and Hol- 
land, till she had gained a considerable dis- 
tance from the English coast, and tKen-v^uld 
sail north along the eastern shores of the GeK 
man Ocean. He advised that Elizabeth should 
send spies to Calais and to Havre, and per- 



80 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

haps to other French ports, to watch there, and 
to let her know whenever they observed any 
appearances of preparations for Mary's depart- 
ure. 

In the mean time, as the hour for Mary's 
farewell to Paris and all its scenes of luxury 
and splendor, drew near, those who had loved 
her were drawn more closely to her in heart 
than ever, and those who had been envious 
and jealous began to relent, and to look upon 
her with feelings of compassion and of kind 
regard. Queen Catharine treated her with ex- 
treme kindness during the last few days of her 
stay, and she accompanied her for some dis- 
tance on her journey, with every manifesta- 
tion of sincere affection and good-will. She 
stopped, at length, at St. Germain, and there, 
with many tears, she bade her gentle daughter- 
in-law a long and last farewell. 

Many princes and nobles, especially of the 
family of Guise, Mary's relatives, accompanied 
her through the whole journey. They formed 
quite a long cavalcade, and attracted great at- 
tention in all the towns and districts through 
which they passed. They traveled slowly, 
but at length arrived at Calais, where they 
waited nearly a week to complete the arrange- 
ments for Mary's embarkation. At length the 
day arrived for her to set sail. A large con- 
course of spectators assembled to witness the 



EETtJRN TO SCOTLAND. 81 

scene. Four ships had been provided for the 
transportation of the party and their effects. 
Two of these were galleys. They were pro- 
vided with banks of oars, and large crews of 
rowers, by means of which the vessels could 
be propelled when the wind failed. The two 
other vessels were merely vessels of burden, 
to carry the furniture and other effects of the 
passengers. 

Many of the queen's friends were to accom- 
pany her to Scotland. The Four Maries were 
among them. She bade those that were to re- 
main behind farewell, and prepared to embark 
on board the royal galley. Her heart was 
very sad. Just at this time, a vessel which 
was coming in struck against a pier, in conse- 
quence of a heavy sea which was rolling in, 
and of the distraction of the seamen occasioned 
by Mary's embarkation. The vessel which 
struck was so injured by the concussion that 
it filled immediately and sank. Most of the 
seamen on board were drowned. This acci- 
dent produced great excitement and confusion. 
Mary looked upon the scene from the deck of 
her vessel, which was now slowly moving 
from the shore. It alarmed her, and impressed 
her mind with a sad and mournful sense of 
the dangers of the elements to whose mercy 
she was now to be committed for many days. 
"What an unhappy omen is this!" she ex- 



82 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

claimed. She then went to the stern of the 
ship, looked back at the shore, then knelt 
down, and, covering her face with her hands, 
sobbed aloud. "Farewell, France !'' she ex- 
claimed : "1 shall never, never see thee more." 
Presently, when her emotions for a moment 
subsided, she would raise her eyes, and take 
another view of the slowly-receding- shore, and 
then exclaim again, " Farewell, my beloved 
France ! farewell ! farewell \" 
-^She remained in this position, suffering ihis 
anguish, for five hours, when it began to grow 
dark, and she could no longer see the shore. 
She then rose, saying that her beloved country 
was gone from her sight forever. *' The dark- 
ness, like a thick veil, hides thee from my 
siijht, and I shall see thee no more. So fare- 
well, beloved land ! farewell forever ! " She 
left her place at the stern, but she would not 
leave the deck. She made them bring up a 
bed, and place it for her there, near the stern. . 
They tried to induce her to go into the cabin, 
or at least to take some supper ; but she would 
not. She lay down upon her bed. She charged 
the helmsman to awaken her at the dawn, if 
the land was in sight when the dawn should 
appear. She then wept herself to sleep. 

During the night the air was calm, and the 
vessels in which Mary and her company had 
embarked made such small progress, being 



RETURN TO SCOTLAND. 83 

worked only by the oars, that the land came 
into view again with the gray light of the 
morning. The helmsman awoke Mary, and the 
sight of the shore renewed her anguish and 
tears. She said that she could not go. She 
wished that Elizabeth's ships would come in 
sight, so as to compel her squaciron to return. 
But no English fleet appeared. On the con- 
trary, the breeze freshened. The sailors un- 
furled the sails, the oars were taken in, and the 
great crew of oarsmen rested from their toil. 
The ships began to make their way rapidly 
through the rippling water. The land soon 
became a faint, low cloud in the horizon, and 
in an hour all traces of it entirely disappeared. 
The voyage continued for ten days. They 
saw nothing of Elizabeth's cruisers. It was 
afterward ascertained, however, that these 
ships were atone time very near to them, and 
were only prevented from seeing and taking 
them by a dense fog, which at that time hap- 
pened to cover the sea. One of the vessels of 
burden was seen and taken, and carried to 
England. It contained, however, only some 
of Mary's furniture and effects. She herself 
escaped the danger. 

The fog, which was thus Mary's protection 
at one, time, was a source of great difficulty 
and danger at another ; for, when they were 
drawing near to the place of their landing in 

7_Mary 



84 MARY QUEEK OF SCOTS. 

Scotland, they were enveloped in a fog SO 
dense that they could scarcely see from one 
end of the vessel to the other. They stopped 
the progress of their vessels, and kept con- 
tinually sounding ; and when at length the 
fog cleared away, they found themselves in- 
volved in a labyrinth of rocks and shoals of 
the most dangerous character. They made 
their escape at last, and went on safely toward 
the land. Mary said, however, that she felt, 
at the time, entirely indifferent as to the re- 
sult. She was so disconsolate and wretched 
at having parted forever from all that was dear 
to her, that it seemed to her that she was 
equally willing to live or to die. 

Mary, who, among her other accomplish- 
ments, had a great deal of poetic talent, wrote 
some lines, called her Farewell to France, 
which have been celebrated from that day to 
this. They are as follows : 

Adieu. 

Adieu, plaisant pays de France ! 

O ma patrie, 

La plus cherie ; 
Qui a nourri ma jeune enfance. 
Adieu, France ! adieu, mes beaux jours ! 
La nef qui dejoint mes amours, 
N'a cy de moi que la moitie ; 
Une parte te reste ; elle est tienne ; 
Je la fie a ton amitie, 
Pour que de I'autre il te souvienne. 



RETURN TO SCOTLAND. 85 

Many persons have attempted to translate 
these h"nes intoEnghsh verse ; but it is always 
extremely difhcult to translate poetry from 
one languai^e to another. We give here two of 
the best of these translations. The reader 
can judge, by observing how different they 
are from each other, how different they must 
both be from their common original 

Adieu. 

Farewell to thee, thou pleasant shore, 
The loved, the cherished home to me 

Of infant joy, a dream that's o'er. 
Farewell, dear France ! farewell to thee ! 

The sail that wafts me bears away 
From thee but half my soul alone ; 

Its fellow half will fondly stay, 
And back to thee has faithful flown. 

I trust it to thy gentle care ; 

For all that here remains with me 
Lives but to think of all that's there, 

Tolove and to remember thee. 

The other translation is as follows : 

Adieu. 

Adieu, thou pleasant land of France ! 

The dearest of all lands to me. 
Where life was like a joyful dance, 

The joyful dance of infancy. 

Farewell my childhood's laughing wiles, 
Farewell the joys of youth's bright day ; 

The bark that takes me from thy smiles, 
Bears but my meaner half away. 



86 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

The best is thine ; my changeless heart 
Is given, beloved France, to thee ; 

And let it sometimes, though we part, 
Remind thee, with a sigh, of me. 

It was on the 19th of August, 1561, that the 
two galleys arrived at Leith, Leith is a small 
port on the shore of the Frith of Forth, about 
two miles from Edinburgh, which is situated 
somewhat inland. The royal palace, where 
Mary was to reside, was called the Palace of 
Holyrood. It was, and is still, a large square 
building, with an open court in the center, into 
which there is access for carriages through a 
large arched passage-way in the center of the 
principal front of the building. In the rear, 
but connected with the palace, there was a 
chapel in Mary's day, though it is now in 
ruins. The walls still remain, but the roof is 
gone. The people of Scotland were not ex- 
pecting Mary so soon. Information was com- 
municated from country to country, in those 
days, slowly and with great difficulty. Per- 
haps the time of Mary's departure from France 
was purposely concealed even from the Scotch, 
to avoid all possibility that the knowledge of 
it should get into Elizabeth's possession. 

At any rate, the first intelligence which the 
inhabitants of Edinburgh and the vicinity had 
of the arrival of their queen, was the approach 
of the galleys to the shore, and the firing of a 




Mary, /ace p. 86 



Landing ol Mary at Leith. 



RETURN TO SCOTLAND. 87 

royal salute from their guns. The Palace of 
Holyrood was not ready for Mary's reception, 
and she had to remain a day at Leith, await- 
ing the necessary preparations. In the mean 
time, the whole population began to assemble 
to welcome her arrival. Military bands were 
turned out ; banners were prepared ; civil and 
military officers in full costume assembled, 
and bonfires and illuminations were provided 
for the evening and night. In a word, Mary's 
subjects in Scotland did all in their power to 
do honor to the occasion ; but the preparations 
were so far beneath the pomp and pageantry 
which she had been accustomed to in France, 
that she felt the contrast very keenly, and real- 
ized, more forcibly than 'ever, how great was 
the change which the circumstances of her 
life were undergoing. 

Horses were prepared for Mary and her large 
company of attendants, to ride from Leith to 
Edinburgh. The long cavalcade moved to- 
ward evening. The various professions and 
trades of Edinburgh were drawn up in lines on 
each side of the road, and thousands upon 
thousands of other spectators assembled to 
witness the scene. When she reached the 
Palace ot Holyrood House, a band of music 
played for a time under her windows, and then 
the great throng quietly dispersed, leaving 
Mary to her repose. The adjoining engraving 



88 MARY QUEEN OP SCOTS. 

represents the Palace of Holyrood as it now 
appears. In Mary's day, the northern part 
only had been built — that is, the part on the 
left, in the view, where the ivy climbs about 
the windows — and the range extending back 
to the royal chapel, the ruins of which are seen 
in the rear. Mary took up her abode in this 
dwelling, and was glad to rest from the fa- 
tigues and privations of her long voyage ; but 
she found her new home a solitary and gloomy 
dwelling, compared with the magnificent 
palaces of the land she had left. 

Mary made an extremely favorable impres- 
sion upon her subjects in Scotland. To please 
them, she exchanged the white mourning of 
France, from which she had taken the name 
of the White Queen, for a black dress, more 
accordant with the ideas and customs of her 
native land. This gave her a more sedate and 
matronly character, and though the expression 
of her countenance and figure was somewhat 
changed by it, it was only a change to a new 
form of extreme and fascinating beauty. Her 
manners, too, so graceful and easy, and yet so 
simple and unaffected, charmed all who saw 
her. 

Mary had a half brother in Scotland, whose 
title was at this time the Lord James. He 



RETURN TO SCOTLAND. ©» 

was afterward named the Earl of Murray, and 
is commonly known in history under this latter 
designation. The mother of Lord James was 
not legally married to Mary's father, and con- 
sequently he could not inherit any of his fa- 
ther's rights to the Scottish crown. The Lord 
James was, however, a man of very high rank 
and influence, and Mary immediately received 
him into her service, and made him one of her 
highest ministers of state. He was now about 
thirty years of age, prudent, cautious, and wise, 
of good person and manners, but somewhat 
reserved and austere. 

Lord James had the general direction of af- 
fairs on Mary's arrival,, and things went on 
very smoothly for a week ; but then, on the 
first Sunday after the landing, a very serious 
difficulty threatened to occur. The Catholics 
have a certain celebration, called the mass, to 
which they attach a very serious and solemn 
importance. When our Saviour gave the bread 
and the wine to his disciples at the Last Sup- 
per, he said of it, "This is my body, broken 
for you, "and "This is my blood, shed for you." 
The Catholics understand that these words de- 
note that the bread and wine did at that time, 
and that they do now, whenever the com- 
munion service^ is celebrated by a priest duly 
authorized, become, by a sort of miraculous 
transformation, the true body and blood of 



90 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

Christ, and that the priest, in breaking the one 
and pouring out the other, is really and truly- 
renewing the great sacrifice for sin made by 
Jesus Christ at his crucifixion. The mass, 
therefore, in which the bread and the wine are 
so broken and poured out, becomes, in their 
view, not a mere service of prayer and praise 
to God, but a solemn act of sacrifice. The 
spectators, or assistants, as they call them, 
meaning all who are present on the occasion, 
stand by, not merely to hear words of adoration, 
in which they mentally join, as is the case in 
most Protestant forms of worship, but to wit- 
ness the enactment of a deed, and one of great 
binding force and validity : a real and true 
sacrifice of Christ, made anew, as an atone- 
ment for their sins. The bread, when con- 
secrated, and, as they suppose, transmuted to 
the body of Christ, is held up to view, or car- 
ried in a procession around the church, that all 
present may bow before it, and adore it as 
really being, though in the form of bread, the 
wounded and broken body of the Lord. 

Of course the celebration of the mass is in- 
vested, in the minds of all conscientious Cath- 
olics, with the utmost solemnity and impor- 
tance. They stand silently by, with the deep- 
est feelings of reverence and awe, while the 
priest offers up for them, anew, the great sac- 
rifice for sin. They regard all Protestant wor- 



EETURN TO SCOTLAND. 91 

ship, which consists of mere exhortations to 
duty, hymns and prayers, as Hfeless and void. 
That which is to them the soul, the essence, 
and substance of the whole, is wanting. On 
the other hand, the Protestants abhor the sacri- 
fice of the mass as gross superstition. They 
think that the bread remains simply bread after 
the benediction as much as before ; that for 
the priests to pretend that in breaking it they 
renew the sacrifice of Christ, is imposture ; 
and that to bow before it in adoration and 
homage is the worst idolatry. 

Now it happened that during Mary's absence 
in France, the contest between the Catholics 
and the Protestants had been going fiercely on, 
and the result had been the almost complete 
defeat of the Catholic party, and the establish- 
ment of the Protestant interest throughout the 
realm. A great many deeds of violence accom- 
panied this change. Churches and abbeys 
were sometimes sacked and destroyed. The 
images of saints, which the Catholics had put 
up, were pulled down and broken ; and the 
people were sometimes worked up to frenzy 
against the principles of the Catholic faith and 
Catholic observances. They abhorred the 
mass, and were determined that it should not 
be introduced again into Scotland. 

Queen Mary, knowing this state of things, 
determined, on her arrival in Scotland, not to 



92 MAKY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

interfere with her people in the exercise of 
their religion ; but she resolved to remain a 
Catholic herself, and to continue, for the use 
of her own household, in the royal chapel at 
Holyrood, the same Catholic observances to 
which she had been accustomed in France. 
She accordingly gave orders that mass should 
be celebrated in her chapel on the first Sunday 
after her arrival. She was very willing to ab- 
stain from interfering with the religious usages 
of her subjects, but she was not willing to give 
up her own. 

The friends of the Reformation had a meet- 
ing, and resolved that mass should not he cele- 
brated. There was, however, no way of pre- 
venting it but by intimidation or violence. 
When Sunday came, crowds began to assem- 
ble about the palace and the chapel, and to 
fill all the avenues leading to them. The Cath- 
olic families who were going to attend the serv- 
ice were treated rudely as they passed. The 
priests they threatened with death. One, who 
carried a candle which was to be used in the 
ceremonies, was extremely terrified at their 
threats and imprecations. The excitement 
was very great, and would probably have pro- 
ceeded to violent extremities, had it not been 
for Lord James's energy and courage. He was 



RETURN TO SCOTLAND. 93 

a Protestant, but he took his station at the door 
of the chapel, and, without saying or donig 
anything to irritate the crowd without, he kept 
them at bay, while the service proceeded. It 
went on to the close, though greatly inter- 
rupted by the confusion and uproar. Many of 
the French people who came with Mary were 
so terrified by this scene, that they declared 
they would not stay in such a country, and took 
the first opportunity of returning to France. 

One of the most powerful and influential of 
the leaders of the Protestant party at this time 
was the celebrated John Knox. He was a 
man of great powers of mind and of command- 
ing eloquence ; and he had exerted a vast in- 
fluence in arousing the people of Scotland to 
a feeling of strong abhorrence of what they 
considered the abominations of popery. When 
Queen Mary of England was upon the throne, 
Knox had written a book against her, and 
against queens in general, women having, 
according to his views, no right to govern. 
Knox was a man of the most stern and un- 
compromising character, who feared nothing, 
respected nothing, and submitted to no re- 
straints in the blunt and plain discharge of 
what he considered his duty. Mary dreaded 
his influence and power. 

Knox had an interview with Mary not long 



94 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

after his arrival, and it is one of the most 
striking instances of the strange ascendency 
which Mary's extraordinary beauty and grace, 
and the pensive charm of her demeanor, ex- 
ercised overall that came within her influence, 
that even John Knox, whom nothing else 
could soften or subdue, found his rough and 
indomitable energy half forsaking him in the 
presence of his gentle queen. She expostulated 
with him. He half apologized. Nothing had 
ever drawn the least semblance of an apology 
from him before. He told her that his book 
was aimed solely against Queen Mary of Eng- 
land, and not against her; that she had no 
cause to fear its influence ; that, in respect to 
the freedom with which he had advanced 
his opinions and theories on the subjects of 
government and religion, she need not be 
alarmed, for philosophers had always done this 
in every age, and yet had lived good citizens 
of the state, whose institutions they had, 
nevertheless, in some sense theoretically con- 
demned. He told her, moreover, that he had 
no intention of troubling her reign ; that she 
might be sure of this, since, if he had such a 
desire, he should have commenced his meas- 
ures during her absence, and not have post- 
poned them until her position on the throne 
was strengthened by her return. Thus he 
tried to soothe her fears, and to justify himself 



RETURN TO SCOTLAND. 95 

from Ihe suspicion of having designed any 
injury to such a gentle and helpless queen. 
The interview was a very extraordinary spec- 
tacle. It was that of a lion laying aside his 
majestic sternness and strength to dispel the 
fears and quiet the apprehensions of a dove. 
The interview was, however, after all, painful 
and distressing to Mary. Some things which 
the stern reformer felt it his duty to say to her, 
brought tears into her eyes. 

Mary soon become settled in her new home, 
though many circumstances in her situation 
were well calculated to disquiet and disturb 
her. She lived in the palace at Holyrood. 
The four Maries continued with her for a time, 
and then two of them were married to nobles 
of high rank. Queen Elizabeth sent Mary a 
kind message, congratulating her on her safe 
arrival in Scotland, and assuring her that the 
story of her having attempted to intercept her 
was false. Mary, who had no means of prov- 
ing Elizabeth's insincerity, sent her back a 
polite reply. 

8-M«ry 




CHAPTER VI. 

MARY AND LORD DARNLEY. 

During the three or four years which elapsed 
after Queen Mary's arrival in Scotland, she had 
to pass through many stormy scenes of anxiety 
and trouble. The great nobles of the land 
were continually quarreling, and all parties were 
earnest and eager in their efforts to get Mary's 
influence and power on their side. She had a 
great deal of trouble with the affairs of her 
brother, the Lord James. He wished to have 
the earldom of Murray conferred upon him. 
The castle and estates pertaining to this title 
were in the north of Scotland, in the neigh- 
borhood of Inverness. They were in posses- 
sion of another family, who refused to give 
them up. Mary accompanied Lord James to 
the north with an army, to put him in posses- 
sion. They took the castle, and hung the 
governor, who had refused to surrender at 
their summons. This, and some other acts of 
this expedition, have since been considered 
unjust and cruel ; but posterity have been 
90 



MAEY AND LORD DARNLEY. 97 

divided in opinion on the question how far 
Mary herself was personally reponsible for 
them. 

Mary, at any rate, displayed a great degree 
of decision and energy in her management of 
public affairs, and In the personal exploits 
which she performed. She made excursions 
from castle to castle, and from town to town, 
all over Scotland. On these expeditions she 
traveled on horseback, sometimes with a royal 
escort, and sometimes at the head of an army 
of eighteen or twenty thousand men. These 
royal progresses were made sometimes among 
the great towns and cities on the eastern coast 
of Scotland, and also, at other times, among 
the gloomy and dangerous defiles of the High- 
lands. Occasionally she would pay visits to 
the nobles at their castles, to hunt in their 
parks, to review their Highland retainers, or to 
join them in celebrations and fetes, and military 
parades. 

During all this time, her personal influence 
and ascendency over all who knew her was 
constantly increasing ; and the people of Scot- 
land, notwithstanding the disagreement on the 
subject of religion, became more and more de- 
voted to their queen. The attachment which 
those who were in immediate attendance upon 
her felt to her person and character, was in 
many cases extreme. In one instance, this at- 



98 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

tachment led to a very sad result. There was 
a young Frenchman, named Chatelard, who 
came in Mary's train from France. He was a 
scholar and a poet. He began by writing 
verses in Mary's praise, which Mary read, and 
seemed to be pleased with. This increased 
his interest in her, and led him to imagine that 
he was himself the object of her kind regard. 
Finally, the love which he felt for her came to 
be a perfect infatuation. He concealed himself 
one night in Mary's bed-chamber, armed, as if 
to resist any attack which the attendants might 
make upon him. He was discovered by the 
female attendants, and taken away, and they, 
for fear of alarming Mary, did not tell her of 
the circumstance till the next morning. 

Mary was very much displeased, or, at 
least, professed to be so. John Knox thought 
that this displeasure was only a pretense. 
She, however, forbid Chatelard to come any 
more into her sight. A day or two after this, 
Mary set out on a journey to the north. 
Chatelard followed. He either believed that 
Mary really loved him, or else he was led on 
by that strange and incontrollable infatuation 
which so often, in such cases, renders even 
the wisest men utterly reckless and blind to 
the consequences of what they say or do. He 
watched his opportunity, and one night, when 
Mary retired to her bedroom, he foIlo;p^gd her 



MARY AND LORD DARNLEY. 99 

directly in. Mary called for help. The at- 
tendants came in, and immediately sent for 
the Earl of Murray, who was in the palace. 
Chatelard protested that all he wanted was to 
explain and apologize for his coming into 
Mary's room before, and to ask her to forgive 
him. Mary, however, would not listen. She 
was very much incensed. When Murray 
came in, she directed him to run his dagger 
through the man. Murray, however, instead 
of doing this, had the offender seized and sent 
to prison. In a few days he was tried, and 
condemned to be beheaded. The excitement 
and enthusiasm of his love continued to the 
last. He stood firm and undaunted on the 
scaffold, and, just before he laid his head on 
the block, he turned toward the place where 
Mary was then lodging, and said, '* Farewell ! 
loveliest and most cruel princess that the 
world contains ! " 

In the mean time, Mary and Queen Eliza- 
beth continued ostensibly on good terms. 
They sent ambassadors to each other's courts. 
They communicated letters and messages to 
each other, and entered into various negotia- 
tions respecting the affairs of their respective 
kingdoms. The truth was, each was afraid of 
the other, and neither dared to come to an 
open rupture. Elizabeth was uneasy on ac- 
count of Mary's claim to her crown, and was 

LrfC. 



100 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

very anxious to avoid driving her to extremities, 
since she knew that, in that case, there would 
be great danger of lier attempting openly to 
enforce it. Mary, on the other hand, thought 
that there was more probability of her obtain- 
ing the succession to the English crown by 
keeping peace with Elizabeth than by a quar- 
rel. Elizabeth was not married, and was 
likely to live and die single. Mary would 
then be the next heir, without much question. 
She wished Elizabeth to acknowledge this, 
and to have the English Parliament enact it. 
If Elizabeth would take this course, Mary was 
willing to waive her claims during Elizabeth's 
life. Elizabeth, however, was not willing to 
do this decidedly. She wished to reserve the 
right to herself of marrying if she chose. She 
also wished to keep Mary dependent upon her 
as long as she could. Hence, while she would 
not absolutely refuse to comply with Mary's 
proposition, she would not really accede to it, 
but kept the whole matter in suspense by end- 
less procrastination, difficulties, and delays. 

I have said that, after Elizabeth, Mary's 
claim to the British crown was almost unques- 
tioned. There was another lady about as 
nearly related to the English royal line as 
Mary. Her name was Margaret Stuart. Her 
title was Lady Lennox. She had a son named 
Henry Stuart, whose title was Lord Darnley. 



MARY AND LOKD DAllNLEY. 101 

It was a question whether Mary or Margaret 
were best entitled to consider herself the heir 
to the British crown after Eliziibeth. Mary, 
therefore, had two obstacles in the way of the 
accomplishment of her wishes to be Queen of 
England : one was the claim of Elizabeth, who 
was already in possession of the throne, and 
the other the claims of Lady Lennox, and, after 
her, of her son Darnley. There was a plan of 
disposing of this last difficulty in a very simple 
manner. It was, to have Mary marry Lord 
Darnley, and thus unite these two claims. 
This plan had been proposed, but there had 
been no decision in respect to it. There 
was one objection : that Darnley being Mary's 
cousin, their marriage was forbidden by the 
laws of the Catholic Church. There was no 
way of obviating this difficulty but by applying 
to the Pope to grant them a special dispensa- 
tion. 

In the mean time, a great many other plans 
were formed for Mary's marriage. Several of 
the princes and potentates of Europe applied 
for her hand. They were allured somewhat, 
no doubt, by her youth and beauty, and still 
more, very probably, by the desire to annex 
her kingdom to their dominions. Mary, wish- 
ing to please Elizabeth, communicated often 
with her, to ask her advice and counsel in re- 
gard to her marriage, Elizabeth's policy was 



102 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

to embarrass and perplex the whole subject by 
making difficulties in respect to every plan 
proposed. Finally, she recommended a gentle- 
man of her own court to Mary — Robert Dud- 
ley, whom she afterward made Earl of Leices- 
ter — one of her special favorites. The position 
of Dudley, and the circumstances of the case, 
were such that mankind have generally sup- 
posed that Elizabeth did not seriously imagine 
that such 'a plan could be adopted, but that she 
proposed it, as perverse and intriguing people 
often do, as a means of increasing the difficulty. 
Such minds often attempt to prevent doing 
doing what can be done by proposing and urg- 
ing what they know is impossible. 

In the course of these negotiations. Queen 
Mary once sent Melville, her former page of 
honor in France, as a special ambassador to 
Queen Elizabeth, to ascertain more perfectly 
her views. Melville had followed Mary, to 
Scotland, and had entered her service there as 
a confidential secretary ; and as she had great 
confidence in his prudence and in his fidelity, 
she thought him the most suitable person to 
undertake this mission. Melville afterward 
lived to an advanced age, and in the latter part 
of his life he wrote a narrative of his various 
adventures, and recorded, in quaint and ancient 
language, many of his conversations and inter- 
views with the two queens. His mission to 



MARY AND LORD DARNLEY. 103 

England was of course a very important event 
in his life, and one of the most curious and en- 
tertaining passages in his memoirs is his narra- 
tive of his interviews with the English queen. 
He was, at the time, about thirty-four years of 
age. Mary was about twenty-two. 

Sir James Melville was received with many 
marks of attention and honor by Queen Eliza- 
beth. His first interview with her was in a 
garden near the palace. She first asked him 
about a letter which Mary had recently written 
to her, and which, she said, had greatly dis- 
pleased her ; and she took out a reply from her 
pocket, written in very sharp and severe lan- 
guage, though she said she had not sent it be- 
cause it was not severe enough, and she was 
going to write another. Melville asked to see 
the letter from Mary which had given Eliza- 
beth so much offense ; and on reading it, he ex- 
plained it, and disavowed, on Mary's part, any 
intention to give offense, and thus finally suc- 
ceeded in appeasing Elizabeth's displeasure, 
and at length induced her to tear up her angry 
reply. 

Elizabeth then wanted to know what >Mary 
thought of her proposal of Dudley for her hus- 
band. Melville told her that she had not given 
the subject much reflection, but that she was 
going to appoint two commissioners, and she 
wished Elizabeth to appoint two others, and 



104 MAKY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

then that the four should meet on the borders 
of the two countries, and consider the whole 
subject of the marriage. Elizabeth said that 
she perceived that Mary did not think much of 
this proposed match. She said, however, that 
Dudley stood extremely high in her regard ; 
that she was going to make him an earl, and 
that she should marry him herself were it not 
that she was fully resolved to live and die a 
single woman. She said she wished very much 
to have Dudley become Mary's husband, both 
on account of her attachment to him, and also 
on account of his attachment to her, which she 
was sure would prevent his allowing her, that 
is, Elizabeth, to have any trouble out of Mary's 
claim to her crown as long as she lived. 

Elizabeth also asked Melville to wait in 
Westminster until the day appointed for mak- 
ing Dudley an earl. This was done, a short 
time afterward, with great ceremony. Lord 
Darnley, then a very tall and slender youth of 
about nineteen, was present on the occasion. 
His father and mother had been banished from 
Scotland, on account of some political offenses, 
twenty years before, and he had thus himself 
been brought up in England. As he was a 
near relative of the queen, and a sort of heir- 
presumptive to the crown, he had a high posi- 
tion at the court, and his office was, on this oc- 
casion, to bear the sword of honor before the 



MARY AND LORD DARNLEY. 106 

queen Dudley kneeled before Elizabeth while 
she put upon him the badges of his new dig- 
nity Afterward she asked Melville what he 
thought of him. Melville was polite enough 
to speak warmly in his favor. ''And yet, 
caid the queen, - I suppose you prefer yonder 
^long lad," pointing to Darnley. She knew 
something of Mary's half-formed design of 
making Darnley her husband. Melville, who 
did not wish her to suppose that Mary had any 
serious intention of choosing Darnley, said 
that "no woman of spirit would choose such 
a person as he was, for he was handsome 
beardless, and lady-faced; in fact, he looked 
more like a woman than a man." 

Melville was not very honest in this, for he 
had secret instructions at this very time to ap- 
ply to Lady Lennox, Darnley's mother, to send 
her son into Scotland, in order that Mary might 
see him and be assisted to decide the question 
of becoming his wife, by ascertaining how she 
was going to like him personally. Queen 
Elizabeth, in the mean time, pressed upon 
Melville the importance of Mary's deciding 
soon ;n favor of the marriage with Leicester. 
As to declaring in favor of Mary's right to in- 
hent the crown after her, she said the question 
was in the hands of the great lawyers and com- 
missioners to whom she had referred it, and 
that she heartily wished that they might come 



106 MARY QUEEN OF SCOfS. 

to a conclusion in favor of Mary's claim. She 
should urge the business forward as fast as she 
could ; but the result would depend very much 
upon the disposition which Mary showed to 
comply with her wishes in respect to the mar- 
riage. She said she should never marry her- 
self unless she was compelled to it on account 
of Mary's giving her trouble by her claims up- 
on the crown, and forcing her to desire that it 
should go to her direct descendants. If Mary 
would act wisely, and as she ought, and follow 
her counsel, she would, in due time, have all 
her desire. 

Some time more elapsed in negotiations and 
delays. There was a good deal of trouble in 
getting leave for Darnley to go to Scotland. 
From his position, and from the state of the 
laws and customs of the two realms, he 
could not go without Elizabeth's permission. 
Finally, Mary sent word to Elizabeth that she 
would marry Leicester according to her wish, 
if she would have her claim to the English 
crown, after Elizabeth, acknowledged and es- 
tablished by the English government, so as to 
have that question definitely and finally settled. 
Elizabeth sent back for answer to this pro- 
posal, that if Mary married Leicester, she 
would advance him to great honors and digni- 
ties, but that she could not do anything at 
present about the succession. She also, at the 




Mary, face p. 106 



Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley. 



MARY AND LORD DARNLEY. 107 

same time, gave permission to Darnley to go 
to Scotland. 

It is thought that Elizabeth never seriously 
intended that Mary should marry Leicester, 
and that she did not suppose Mary herself 
would consent to it on any terms. Accord- 
ingly, when she found Mary was acceding to 
the plan, she wanted to retreat from it herself, 
and hoped that Darnley's going to Scotland, 
and appearing there as a new competitor in 
the field, would tend to complicate and em- 
barrass the question in Mary's mind, and help 
to prevent the Leicester negotiation from going 
any further. At any rate, Lord Darnley — 
then a very tall and handsome young man of 
nineteen — obtained suddenly permission to go 
to Scotland. Mary went to Wemyss Castle, 
and made arrangements to have Darnley come 
and visit her there. 

Wemyss Castle is situated in a most roman- 
tic and beautiful spot on the seashore, on the 
northern side of the Frith of Forth. Edin- 
burgh is upon the southern side of the Frith, 
and is in full view from the windows of the 
castle, with Salisbury Crags and Arthur's Seat 
on the left of the city. Wemyss Castle was, at 
this time, the residence of Murray, Mary's 
brother. Mary's visit to it was an event which 
attracted a great deal of attention. The peo- 
ple flocked into the neighborhood and provi- 



108 MAKY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

sions and accommodations of every kind rose 
enormously in price. Every one was eager to 
get a glimpse of the beautiful queen. Besides, 
they knew that Lord Darnley was expected, 
and the rumor that he was seriously thought 
of as her future husband had been widely 
circulated, and had awakened, of course, a 
universal desire to see him. 

Mary was very much pleased with Darnley. 
She told Melville, after their first interview, 
that he was the handsomest and best propor- 
tioned " long man " she had ever seen. Darn- 
ley was, in fact, very tall, and as he was 
straight and slender, he appeared even taller 
than he really was. He was, however, though 
young, very easy and graceful in his manners, 
and highly accomplished. Mary was very 
much pleased with him. She had almost de- 
cided to make him her husband before she saw 
him, merely from poHtical considerations, on 
account of her wish to combine his claim "with 
hers in respect to the English crown. Eliza- 
beth's final answer, refusing the terms on 
which Mary had consented to marry Leicester, 
which came about this time, vexed her, and 
determined her to abandon that plan. And 
now, just in such a crisis, to find Darnley 
possessed of such strong personal attractions, 
seemed to decide the question. In a few days 
her imagination was full of pictures of joy and 



MARY AND LORD DARNLEY* 109 

J)leasure, in anticipations of union with such 
a husband. 

The thing took the usual course of such af- 
fairs. Darnley asked Mary to be his wife. 
She said no, and was offended with him for 
asking it. He offered her a present of a ring. 
She refused to accept it. But the no meant 
yes, and the rejection of the ring was only the 
prelude to the acceptance of something far 
more important, of which a ring is the symbol. 
Mary's first interview with Darnley was in Feb- 
ruary. In April, Queen Elizabeth's ambassa- 
dor sent her word that he was satisfied that 
Mary's marriage with Darnley was all arranged 
and settled. 

Queen Elizabeth was', or pretended to be, 
in a great rage. She sent the most urgent re- 
monstrances to Mary against the execution of 
the plan. She forwarded, also, very decisive 
orders to Darnley, and to the Earl of Lennox 
his father, to return immediately to England. 
Lennox replied that he could not return, for 
' ' he did not think the climate would agree with 
him ! " Darnley sent back word that he had 
entered the service of the Queen of Scots, and 
henceforth should obey her orders alone. Eliz- 
abeth, however, was not the only one who 
opposed this marriage. The Earl of Murray, 
Mary's brother, who had been thus far the 
great manager of the government under Mary, 

9-M*ry 



110 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

took at once a most decided stand against it. 
He enlisted a great number of Protestant 
nobles with him, and they held deliberations, 
in which they formed plans for resisting it by 
force. But Mary, who, with all her gentle- 
ness and loveliness of spirit, had, like other 
women, some decision and energy when an 
object in which the heart is concerned is at 
stake, had made up her mind. She sent to 
France to get the consent of her friends there. 
She despatched a commissioner to Rome to ob. 
tain the Pope's dispensation ; she obtained the 
sanction of her own Parliament ; and, in fact, 
in every way hastened the preparations for 
the marriage. 

Murray, on the other hand, and his confed- 
erate lords, were determined to prevent it. 
They formed a plan to rise in rebellion against 
Mary, to waylay and seize her, to imprison 
her, and to send Darnley and his father to 
England, having made arrangements with 
Elizabeth's ministers to receive them at the 
borders. The plan was all well matured, and 
would probably have been carried into effect, 
had not ]\Iary, in some way or other, obtained 
information of the design. She was then at 
Stirling, and they were to waylay her on the 
usual route to Edinburgh. She made a sudden 
journey, at an unexpected time, and by a new 
and unusual road, and thus evaded her ene- 




Mary, face p. iiO 



The Earl of Murray. 



MARY And LORb darnley. Ill 

mies. The violence of this opposition only- 
stimulated her determination to carry the mar- 
riage into effect without delay. Her escape 
from her rebellious nobles took place in June, 
and she was married in July. This was six 
months after her first interview with Darnley. 
The ceremony was performed in the royal 
chapel at Holyrood. They show, to this day, 
the place where she is said to have stood, in 
the now roofless interior. 

Mary was conducted into the chapel by her 
father and another nobleman, in the midst of a 
large company of lords and ladies of the court, 
and of strangers of distinction, who had come 
to Edinburgh to witness the ceremony. A 
vast throng had collected also around the 
palace. Mary was led to the altar, and then 
Lord Darnley was conducted in. The mar- 
riage ceremony was performed according to 
the Catholic ritual. Three rings, one of them 
a diamond ring of great value, were put upon 
her finger. After the ceremony, largess was 
proclaimed, and money distributed among the 
crowd, as had been done in Paris at Mary's 
former marriage, five years before. Mary then 
remained to attend the celebration of mass, 
Darnley, who was not a Catholic, retiring. 
After the mass, Mary returned to the palace, 
and changed the mourning dress which she 
had continued to wear from the time of her 



112 MARY QUEEN OE SCOTS. 

first husband's death to that hour, for one 
more becoming a bride. The evening was 
spent in festivities of every kind. 

We have said that Darnley w^as personally 
attractive in respect both to his countenance 
and his manners ; and, unfortunately, this is 
all that can be said in his favor. He vi^as 
weak-minded, and yet self-conceited and vain. V 
The sudden elevation which his marriage with 
a queen gave him, made him proud, and he 
soon began to treat all around him in a very 
haughty and imperious manner. He seems to 
have been entirely unaccustomed to exercise 
any self-command, or to submit to any restraints 
in the gratification of his passions. Mary paid 
him a great many attentions, and took great 
pleasure in conferring upon him, as her queenly 
power enabled her to do, distinctions and 
honors : but, instead of being grateful for 
them, he received them as matters of course, 
and was continually demanding more. There 
was one title which he wanted, and which, for 
some good reason, it was necessary to post- 
pone conferring upon him. A nobleman came 
to him one day and informed him of the neces- 
sity of this delay. He broke into a fit of passion, 
drew his dagger, rushed toward the nobleman, 
and attempted to stab him. He commenced 
his imperious and haughty course of procedure 
even before his marriage, and continued it 



MARY AND LORD DARNLEY. 113 

afterward, growing more and more violent as 
his ambition increased with an increase of 
power. Mary felt these cruel acts of selfish- 
ness and pride very keenly, but, woman-like, 
she palliated and excused them, and loved him 
still. 

She had, however, other trials and cares 
pressing upon her immediately. Murray and 
his confederates organized a formal and open 
rebellion. Mary raised an army and took the 
field against them. The country generally 
took her side. A terrible and somewhat pro- 
tracted civil war ensued, but the rebels were 
finally defeated and driven out of the country. 
They went to England and claimed Elizabeth's 
protection, saying that she had incited them 
to the revolt, and promised them her aid. 
Elizabeth told them that it would not do for 
her to be supposed to have abetted a rebellion 
in her cousin Mary's dominions, and that, un- 
less they would, in the presence of the foreign 
ambassadors at her court, disavow her having 
done so, she could not help them or counte- 
nance them in any way. The miserable men, 
being reduced to a hard extremity, made this 
disavowal. Elizabeth then said to them, 
"Now you have told the truth. Neither I, 
nor any one else in my name, incited you 
against your queen ; and your abominable 
treason may set an example to my own sub- 



114 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

jects to rebel against me. So get you gone 
out of my presence, miserable traitors as you 
are." 

Thus Mary triumphed over all the obstacles 
to her marriage with the man she loved ; but, 
alas ! before the triumph was fully accomplish- 
ed, the love was gone. Darnley was selfish, 
unfeeling, and incapable of requiting affection 
like Mary's. He treated her with the most 
heartless indifference, though she had done 
everything to aw^aken his gratitude and win 
his love. She bestowed upon him every honor 
which it was in her power to grant. She gave 
him the title of king. She admitted him to 
share with her the powers and prerogatives of 
the crown. There is to this day, in Mary's 
apartments at Holyrood House, a double 
throne which she had made for herself and her 
husband, with their initials worked together 
in the embroidered covering, and each seat 
surmounted by a crown. Mankind have al- 
ways felt a strong sentiment of indignation at 
the ingratitude w^hich could requite such love 
with such selfishness and cruelty. 



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CHAPTER VII. 



RIZZIO. 



Mary had a secretary named David Rizzio. 
He was from Savoy, a country among the 
Alps. It was the custom then, as it is now, 
for the various governments of Europe to have 
ambassadors at the courts of other govern- 
ments, to attend to any negotiations, or to 
the transaction of any other business which 
might arise between their respective sovereigns. 
These ambassadors generally traveled with 
pomp and parade, taking sometimes many 
attendants with them. The ambassador from 
Savoy happened to bring with him to Scot- 
land, in his train, this young man, Rizzio, in 
1 56 1, that is, just about the time that Mary 
herself returned to Scotland. He was a hand- 
some and agreeable young man, but his rank 
and position were such that, for some years, 
he attracted no attention. 

He was, however, quite a singer, and they 
used to bring him in sometimes to sing in 
Mary's presence with three other singers. His 

115 



116 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

voice, being- a good bass, made up the quar- 
tette. Mary saw him in this way, and as he 
was a good French and ItaHan scholar, and 
was amiable, and intelligent, she gradually 
became somewhat interested in him. Mary 
had, at this time, among her other officers, a 
French secretary, who wTote for her, and 
transacted such other business as required a 
knowledge of the French language. This 
French secretary went home, and Mary ap- 
pointed Rizzio to take his place. 

The native Scotchmen in Mary's court were 
naturally very jealous of the influence of these 
foreigners. They looked down with special 
contempt on Rizzio, considering him of mean 
rank and position, and wholly destitute of all 
claim to the office of confidential secretary to 
the queen. Rizzio increased the difficulty by 
not acting with the reserve and prudence 
which his delicate situation required. The 
nobles, proud of their own rank and import- 
ance, were very much displeased at the degree 
of intimacy and confidence to which Mary 
admitted him. They called him an intruder 
and an upstart. When they came in and found 
him in conversation with the queen, or when- 
ever he accosted her freely, as he was wont to 
do, in their presence, they were irritated and 
vexed. They did not dare to remonstrate 
with Mary, but they took care to express their 



RIZZIO. 117 

feelings of resentment and scorn to the sub- 
ject of them in every possible way. They 
scowled upon him. They directed to him 
looks of contempt. They turned their backs 
upon him, and jostled him in a rude and in- 
sulting manner. All this was a year or two 
before Mary's marriage. 

Rizzio consulted Melville, asking his judg- 
ment as to what he had better do. He said 
that, being Mary's French secretary, he was 
necessarily a good deal in her company, and 
the nobles seemed displeased with it ; but he 
did not see what he could do to diminish or 
avoid the difficulty. Melville replied that the 
nobles had an opinion that he not only per- 
formed the duties of French secretary, but that 
he was fast acquiring a great ascendency in 
respect to all other affairs. Melville further 
advised him to be much more cautious in his 
bearing than he had been, to give place to the 
nobles when they were with him in the 
presence of the queen, to speak less freely, 
and in a more unasuming manner, and to 
explain the whole case to the queen herself, 
that she might co-operate with him in pursuing 
a course which would soothe and conciliate 
the irritated and angry feelings of the nobles. 
Melville said, moreover, that he had himself, 
at one time, at a court on the Continent, been 
placed in a very similar situation to Rizzio's, 



118 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

and had been involved in the same difficulties, 
but had escaped the dangers which threatened 
him by pursuing himself the course which he 
now recommended. 

Rizzio seemed to approve of this counsel, 
and promised to follow it ; but he afterward 
told Melville that he had spoken to the queen 
on the subject, and that she would not con- 
sent to any change, but wished everything to 
go on as it had done. Now the queen, havmg 
great confidence in Melville, had previously 
requested him, that if he saw anything in her 
deportment, or management, or measures, 
which he thought was wrong, frankly to let 
her know it, that she might be warned in 
season, and amend. He thought that this was 
an occasion which required this friendly in- 
terposition, and he took an opportunity to 
converse with heron the subject in a frank and 
plain, but still very respectful manner. He 
made but little impression. Mary said that 
Rizzio was only her private French secretary ; 
that he had nothing to do with the affairs of 
the government ; that, consequently, his ap- 
pointment and his office were her own private 
concern alone, and she should continue to act 
according to her own pleasure in managing 
her own affairs, no matter who was displeased 
by it. 

It is probable that the real ground of offense 



RIZ2I0. 119 

which the nobles had against Rizzio was jeal- 
ousy of his superior influence with the queen. 
They, however, made his religion a great 
ground of complaint against him. He was a 
Catholic, and had come from a strong Catholic 
country, having been born in the northern part 
of Italy. The Italian language was his mother 
tongue. They professed to believe that he 
was a secret emissary of the Pope, and was 
plotting with Mary to bring Scotland back 
under the papal dominion. 

In the mean time, Rizzio devoted himself 
with untirmg zeal and fidelity to the service 
of the queen. He was indefatigable in his 
efforts to please her, and he made himself ex- 
tremely useful to her .in a thousand different 
ways. In fact, his being the object of so much 
dislike and aversion on the part of others, 
made him more and more exclusively devoted 
to the queen, who seemed to be almost his 
only friend. She, too, was urged, by what 
she considered the unreasonable and bitter 
hostility of which her favorite was the object, 
to bestow upon him greater and greater favors. 
In process of time, one after another of those 
about the court, finding that Rizzio's influence 
and power were great, and were increasing, 
began to treat him with respect, and to ask 
for his assistance in gaining their ends. Thus 
Rizzio found his position becoming stronger, 



120 MARY QUEEN OF SCOT^. 

and the probability began to increase that he 
would at length triumph over the enemies 
who had set their faces so strongly against 
him. 

Though he had been at first inclined to follow 
Melville's advice, yet he afterward fell in cordi- 
ally with the policy of the queen, which was, 
to press boldly forward, and put down with 
a strong hand the hostility which had been 
excited against him. Instead, therefore, of at- 
tempting to conceal the degree of favor which 
he enjoyed with the queen, he boasted of and 
displayed it. He would converse often and 
familiarly with her in public. He dressed 
magnificently, like persons of the highest rank, 
and had many attendants. In a word, he as- 
sumed all the airs and manners of a person 
of high distinction and commanding influ- 
ence. The external signs of hostility to 
him were thus put down, but the fires of 
hatred burned none the less fiercely below,, 
and only wanted an opportunity to burst into 
a explosion. 

Things were in this state at the time of the 
negotiations in respect to Darnley's marriage ; 
for, in order to take up the story ofRizzio from 
the beginning, we have been obliged to go 
back in our narrative. Rizzio exerted all his 
influence in favor of the marriage, and thus 
both strengthened his influence with Mary and 



RIZZIO. 



121 



made Darnley his friend. He did all in his 
power to diminish the opposition to it, from 
whatever quarter it might come, and rendered 
essential service in the correspondence with 
France, and in the negotiations with the Pope 
for obtaining the necessary dispensation. In 
a word, he did a great deal to promote the 
marriage, and to facilitate all the arrangements 
for carrying it into effect. 

Darnley relied, therefore, upon Rizzio's 
friendship and devotion to his service, forget- 
ting that, in all these past efforts, Rizzio was 
acting out of regard to Mary's wishes, and not 
to his own. As long, therefore, as Mary and 
Darnley continued to pursue the same objects 
and aims, Rizzio was the common friend 
and ally of both. The enemies of the mar- 
riage, however, disliked Rizzio more than 

ever. 

As Darnley's character developed itself grad- 
ually after his marriage, every body began to 
dislike him also. He was unprincipled and 
vicious, as well as imperious and proud. His 
friendship for Rizzio was another ground of 
dislike to him. The ancient nobles, who had 
been accustomed to exercise the whole control 
in the public affairs of Scotland, found them- 
selves supplanted by this young Italian singer, 
and an English boy not yet out of his teens. 
They were exasperated beyond all bounds, but 



122 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

yet they contrived, for a while, to conceal and 
dissemble their anger. 

It was not very long after the marriage of 
Mary and Darnley before they began to become 
alienated from each other. Mary did every- 
thing for her husband which it was reasonable 
for him to expect her to do. She did, in fact, 
all that was in her power. But he was not 
satisfied. She made him the sharer of her 
throne. He wanted her to give up her place 
to him, and thus make him the sole possessor 
of it. He wanted what was called the crown 
matrimonial. The crown matrimonial denoted 
power with which, according to the old Scot- 
tish law, the husband of a queen could be in- 
vested, enabling him to exercise the royal 
prerogative in his own name, both during the 
life of the queen and also after her death, dur- 
ing the continuance of his own life. This 
made him, in fact, a king for life, exalting him 
above his wife, the real sovereign, through 
whom alone he drived his powers. 

Now Darnley was very urgent to have the 
crown matrimonial conferred upon him. He 
insisted upon it. He would not submit to any 
delay. Mary told him that this was some- 
thing entirely beyond her power to grant. The 
crown matrimonial could only be bestowed by 
a solemn enactment of the Scottish Parlia- 
ment. But Darnley, impatient and reckless, 



RIZZIO. 



123 



like a boy as he was, would not listen to any 
excuse, but teased and tormented Mary about 
the crown matrimonial continually. 

Besides the legal difficulties in the way of 
Mary's conferring these powers upon Darnley 
by her own act, there were other difficulties, 
doubtless, in her mind, arising from the char- 
acter of Darnley, and his unfitness, which was 
every day becoming more manifest, to be in- 
trusted with such power. Only four months 
after his marriage, his rough and cruel treat- 
ment of Mary became intolerable. One day, 
at a house in Edinburgh, where the king and 
queen, and other persons of distinction had 
been invited to a banquet, Darnley, as was his 
custom, was beginning to drink very freely, 
and was trying to urge other persons there to 
drink to excess. Mary expostulated with him, 
endeavoring to dissuade him from such a 
course. Darnley resented these kind cautions, 
and retorted upon her in so violent and brutal 
a manner as to cause her to leave the room and 
the company in tears. 

When they were first married, Mary had 
caused her husband to be proclaimed king, and 
had taken some other similar steps to invest 
him with a share of her own power. But she 
soon found that in doing this she had gone tq 
the extreme of propriety, and that, for the fu= 
ture, she must retreat rather than advance, 

10-M»ry 



124 MARY QUEEN OP SCOTS. 

Accordingly, although he was associated with 
her in the supreme power, she thought it best, 
to keep precedence for her own name before 
his, in the exercise of power. On the coins 
which were struck, the inscription was, "In 
the name of the Queen and King of Scotland. " 
In signing public documents, she insisted on 
having her name recorded first. These things 
irritated and provoked Darnley more and more. 
He was not contented to be admitted to a 
share of the sovereign power which the queen 
possessed in her own right alone. He wished 
to supplant her in it entirely. 

Rizzio, of course, took Queen Mary's part in 
these questions. He opposed the grant of the 
crown matrimonial. He opposed all other 
plans for increasing or extending in any way 
Darnley's power. Darnley was very much in- 
censed against him, and earnestly desired to 
find some way to effect his destruction. He 
communicated these feelings to a certain fierce 
and fearless nobleman named Ruthven, and 
asked his assistance to contrive some way to 
take vengeance upon Rizzio. 

Ruthven was very much pleased to hear this. 
He belonged to a party of the lords of the court 
who also hated Rizzio, though they had hated 
Darnley besides so much that they had not 
communicated to him their hostility to the 
other. Ruthven and his friends had not joined 



iiizzto. 



1^5 



Murray and the other rebels in opposing the 
marriage of Darnley. They had chosen to ac- 
quiesce in it, hoping to maintain an ascend- 
ency over Darnley, regarding him, as they did, 
as a mere boy, and thus retain their power. 
When they found, however, that he was so 
headstrong and unmanageable, and that they 
could do nothing with him, they exerted all 
their influence to have Murray and the other 
exiled lords pardoned and allowed to return, 
hoping to combine with them after their re- 
turn, and then together to make their power 
superior to that of Darnley and Rizzio. They 
considered Darnley and Rizzio both as their 
rivals and enemies. When they found, there- 
fore, that Darnley was' plotting Rizzio's de- 
struction, they felt a very strong as well as a 
very unexpected pleasure. 

Thus, among all the jealousies, and rival- 
ries, and bitter animosities of which the court 
was at this time the scene, the only true and 
honest attachment of one heart to another 
seems to have been that of Mary to Rizzio. 
The secretary was faithful and devoted to the 
queen, and the queen was grateful and kind to 
the secretary. There has been some question 
whether this attachment was an innocent or a 
guilty one. A painting, still hanging in the 
private rooms which belonged to Mary in the 
palace at Holyrood, represents Rizzio as young 



126 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

and very handsome ; on the other hand, some 
of the historians of the day, to disprove the 
possibility of any guilty attachment, say that 
he was rather old and ugly. We may our- 
selves, perhaps, safely infer, that unless there 
were something specially repulsive in his ap- 
pearance and manner, such a heart as Mary's, 
repelled so roughly from the one whom it 
was her duty to love, could not well have re- 
sisted the temptation to seek a retreat and 
a refuge in the kind devotedness of such 
a friend as Rizzio proved himself to be to 
her. 

However this may be, Ruthven made such 
suggestions to Darnley as goaded him to mad- 
ness, and a scheme was soon formed for put- 
ting Rizzio to death. The plan, after being 
deliberately matured in all its arrangements, 
was carried into effect in the following man- 
ner. The event occurred early in the spring 
of 1566, less than a year after Mary's mar- 
riage. 

Morton, who was one of the accomplices, 
assembled a large force of his followers, con- 
sisting, it is said, of five hundred men, which 
he posted in the evening near the palace, and 
when it was dark he moved them silently into 
the central court of the, palace, through the 
entrance E, as marked upon the following 
plan. 



RIZZIO. 



127 



Plan of that part of Holyrood House which 

WAS THE SCENE OF RlZZIo's MURDER. 




L 



r I • • r 




E. Principal entrance. Co. Court of the palace. PP. Piazza around 
it AA Various apartments built in modern times. H. Great hall, 
used now as a gallery of portraits. T. Stair-case. o. ftra-e to 
Mary's apartments, second floor. R. Ante-room. B. Mary's bedroom 
D Dressing-room in one of the towers. C. Cabinet or small room m 
iothe other tower. SS. Stair-cases in the wall. d. Small entrance 
under the tapestry. Ch. Royal chapel, m. Place were Mary and 
Darnley stood at the marriage ceremony. Pa. Passage-way leading to 
the chapel. 

Mary was, at the time of these occurrences, 
in the little room marked C, which was built 
within one of the round towers which form a 
part of the front of the building, and which 
are very conspicuous in any view of the palace 



128 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

of Holyrood. This room was on the third 
floor, and it opened into Mary's bedroom, 
marked B. Darnley had a room of his own 
immediately below Mary's. There was a 
little door, d, leading from Mary's bedroom 
to a private staircase built in the wall. This 
staircase led down into Darnley's room ; and 
there was also a communication from this 
place down through the whole length of the 
castle to the royal chapel, marked Ch, the build- 
ing which is now in ruins. Behind Mary's 
bedroom was an anteroom, R^ with a door, 
o, leading to the public staircase by which 
her apartments were approached. All these 
apartments still remain, and ^re explored an- 
nually by thousands of visitors. 

It was about seven o'clock in the evening 
that the conspirators were to execute their pur- 
pose. Morton remained below in the court 
with his troops, to prevent any interruption. 
He held a high office under the queen, which 
authorized him to bring a force into the court 
of the palace, and his doing so did not alarm 
the inmates. Ruthven was to head the party 
v.'hich was to commit the crime. He was con- 
fined to his bed with sickness at the time, but 
he was so eager to have a share in the pleas- 
ure of destroying Rizzio, that he left his bed, 



RIL'ZIO. 129 

put on a suit of armor, and came forth to the 
work. The armor is preserved in the little 
apartment which was the scene of the tragedy 
to this day. 

Mary was at supper. Two near relatives 
and friends of hers — a gentleman and a lady — 
and Rizzio, were with her. The room is scarce- 
ly large enough to contain a greater number. 
There were, however, two or three servants in 
attendance at a side-table. Darnley came up, 
about eight o'clock, to make observations. 
The other conspirators were concealed in his 
room below, and it was agreed that if Darnley 
found any cause for not proceeding with the 
plan, he was to return immediately and give 
them notice. If, therefore, he should not re- 
turn, after the lapse of a reasonable time, they 
were to follow him up the private staircase, 
prepared to act at once and decidedly as soon 
as they should enter the room. They were 
to come up by this private staircase, in order 
to avoid being intercepted or delayed by the 
domestics in attendance in the anteroom, R^ 
of which there would have been danger if they 
had ascended by the public staircase at T. 

Finding that Darnley did not return, Ruthven 
with his party ascended the stairs, entered the 
bed-chamber through the little door at d, and 
thence advanced to the door of the cabinet, 
his heavy iron armor clanking as he came. 



ISO MARY QtJESN OF SOOTS. 

The queen, alarmed, demanded the meaning 
of this intrusion. Ruthven, whose counte- 
nance was grim and ghastly from the conjoined 
influence of ferocious passion and disease, said 
that they meant no harm to her, but they only 
wanted the villain who stood near her. Rizzio 
perceived that his hour was come. The at- 
tendants flocked in to the assistance of the 
queen and Rizzio. Ruthven's confederates 
advanced to join in the attack, and there en- 
sued one of those scenes of confusion and 
terror, of which those who witness it have no 
distinct recollection *on looking back upon it 
when it is over. Rizzio cried out in an agony 
of fear, and sought refuge behind the queen; 
the queen herself fainted ; the table was over- 
turned ; and Rizzio, having received one wound 
from a dagger, was seized and dragged out 
through the bedchamber, B, and through the 
anteroom, R, to the door, o, where he fell 
down, and was stabbed by the murderers again 
and again, till he ceased to breathe. 

After this scene was over, Darnley and Ruth- 
ven came coolly back into Mary's chamber, 
and, as soon as Mary recovered her senses, be- 
gan to talk of and to justify their act of vio- 
lence, without, however, telling her that Rizzio 
had been killed. .Mary was filled with emo- 
tions of resentment and grief. She bitterly re- 
proached Darnley for such an act of cruelty as 



RIZZIO. IBl 

breaking into her apartment with armed men, 
and seizing and carrying off her friend. She 
told him that she had raised him from his com- 
paratively humble position to make him her 
husband, and now this was his return. Darn- 
ley replied that Rizzio had supplanted him in 
her confidence, and thwarted all his plans, and 
that Mary had shown herself utterly regardless 
of his wishes, under the influence of Rizzio. 
He said that, since Mary had made herself his 
wife, she ought to have obeyed him, and not 
put herself in such a way under the direction 
of another. Mary learned Rizzio's fate the 
next day. 

The violence of the conspirators did not stop 
with the destruction of Rizzio. Some of Mary's 
high officers of government, who were in the 
palace at the time, were obliged to make their 
escape from the windows to avoid being seized 
by Morton and his soldiers in the court. 
Among them was the Earl Bothwell, who 
tried at first to drive Morton out, but in the end 
was obliged himself to flee. Some of these 
men let themselves down by ropes from the 
outer windows. When the uproar and con- 
fusion caused by this struggle was over, they 
found that Mary, overcome with agitation and 
terror, was showing symptoms of fainting 
again, and they concluded to leave her. They 
informed her that she must consider herself a 



132 MARY QtTEEN OP SCOTS. 

prisoner, and, setting a guard at the door of 
her apartment, they went away, leaving her 
to spend the night in an agony of resentment, 
anxiety, and fear. 

Lord Darnley took the government at once 
entirely into his own hands. He prorogued 
Parliament, which was then just commencing 
a session, in his own name alone. He organ- 
ized an administration, Mary's officers having 
fled. In saying that he did these things, we 
mean, of course, that the conspirators did them 
in his name. He was still but a boy, scarcely 
out of his teens, and incapable of any other ac- 
tion in such an emergency but a blind compli- 
ance with the wishes of the crafty men who 
had got him into their power by gratifying his 
feelings of revenge. They took possession of 
the p-overnment in his name, and kept Mary 
a close prisoner. 

The murder was committed on Saturday 
night. The next morning, of course, was Smi- 
day. Melville was going out of the palace 
about ten o'clock. As he passed along under 
the window where Mary was confined, she 
called out to him for help. He asked her what 
he could do for her. She told him to go to 
the provost of Edinburgh, the officer corre- 
sponding to the mayor of a city in this country, 
and ask him to call out the city guard, and 
come and release her from her captivity. ' * Go 



Eizzio. 133 

quick," said she, " or the guards will see you 
and stop you." Just then the guards came up 
and challenged Melville. He told them he 
was going to the city to attend church ; so 
they let him pass on. He went to the pro- 
vost, and delivered Mary's message. The 
provost said he dared not, and could not in- 
terfere. 

So Mary remained a prisoner. Her captiv- 
ity, however, was of short duration. In two 
days Darnley came to see her. He persuaded 
her that he himself had had nothing to do with 
the murder of Rizzio. Mary, on the other hand, 
persuaded him that it was better for them to be 
friends to each other than to live thus in a per- 
petual quarrel. She convinced him that Ruth- 
ven and his confederates were not, and could 
not be, his friends. They would only make 
him the instrument of obtaining the objects of 
their ambition. Darnley saw this. He felt 
that he as well as Mary were in the rebels' 
power. They formed a plan to escape to- 
gether. They succeeded. They fled to a 
distant castle, and collected a large army, the 
people everywhere flocking to the assistance 
of the queen. They returned to Edinburgh in 
a short time in triumph. The conspirators fled. 
Mary then decided to pardon and recall the 
old rebels, and expend her anger henceforth 
on the new ; and thus the Earl Murray, her 



134 



MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 



brother, was brought back, and once more re- 
stored to favor. 

After settling all these troubles, Mary re- 
tired to Edinburgh Castle, where it was sup- 




Room in which Mary waa Imprisoned, 
posed she could be best protected, and in the 
month of July following the murder of Rizzio, 
she gave birth to a son. In this son was after- 
ward accomplished all her fondest wishes, for 
he inherited in the end both the English and 
Scottish crowub. 




CHAPTER VIII. 



BOTHWELL. 



The Earl of Bothwell was a man of great 
energy of character, fearless and decided in 
all that he undertook, and sometimes perfectly 
reckless and uncontrollable. He was in Scot- 
land at the time of Mary's return from France, 
but he was so turbulent and unmanageable 
that he was at one time sent into banishment. 
He was, however, afterward recalled, and 
again intrusted with power. He entered ar- 
dently into Mary's service in her contest with 
the murderers of Rizzio. He assisted her in 
raising an army after her flight, and in con- 
quering Morton, Ruthven, and the rest, and 
driving them out of the country. Mary soon 
began to look upon him as, notwithstanding 
his roughness, her best and most efficient 
friend As a reward for these services, she 
granted him a castle, situated in a romantic 
position on the eastern coast of Scotland. It 
was called the Castle of Dunbar. It was on 
a stormy promontory, overlooking the Ger- 

135 



136 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

man Ocean : a very appropriate retreat and 
fastness for such a man of iron as he. 

In those days, the border country between 
England and Scotland was the resort of rob- 
bers, freebooters, and outlaws from both 
lands. If pursued by one government, they 
could retreat across the line and be safe. In- 
cursions, too, were continually made across 
this frontier by the people of either side, to 
plunder or to destroy whatever property was 
within reach. Thus the country became a re- 
gion of violence and bloodshed which all men 
of peace and quietness were glad to shun. 
They left it to the possession of men who 
could find pleasure in such scenes of violence 
and blood. When Queen Mary had got quietly 
settled in her government, after the overthrow 
of the murderers of Rizzio, as she thus no lon- 
ger needed Bothwell's immediate aid, she sent 
him to this border country to see if he could 
enforce some sort of order among its lawless 
population. 

The birth of Mary's son was an event of the 
greatest importance, not only to her personally, 
but in respect to the political prospects of the 
two great kingdoms, for in this infant were 
combined the claims of succession to both the 
Scotch and English crowns. The whole world 
knew that if Elizabeth should die without 
leaving a direct heir, this child would become 



BOTHWELL. 1°" 

the monarch both of England and Scotland, 
and as such, one of the greatest personages 
in Europe. His birth, therefore, was a great 
event, and it was celebrated in Scotland with 
universal rejoicings. The tidings of it spread 
as news of great public niterest all over 
Europe. Even Elizabeth pretended to be 
pleased, and sent messages of c-S-tu at.on 
to Mary. But every one thought that they 
could see in her air and manner, when she re- 
ceived the intelligence, obvious traces of mor- 
tification and chagrin. 

Mary's heart was filled, at first, with mater- 
nal pride and joy ; but herhappiness was soon 
sadly alloyed by Darnley's continued unkind- 
ness She traveled about during the autumn, 
from castle to castle, anxious and ill at ease. 
Sometimes Darnley followed her, and some- 
times he amused himself with hunting and 
with various vicious indulgences, at different 
towns and castles at a distance from her He 
wanted her to dismiss her ministry and put 
him into power, and he took every possible 
„eans to importune or tease her into comph- 
ance with this plan. At one time he said he 
had resolved to leave Scotland, and go and re- 
side in France ; and he pretended to make h^ 
preparations, and to be about to take h.sleave_ 
He seems to have thought that Mary, though 
he knew that she no longer loved him. would 



11— Mary 



138 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

be distressed at the idea of being abandoned 
by one who was, after all, her husband. Mary- 
was, in fact, distressed at this proposal, and 
urged him not to go. He seemed determined, 
and took his leave. Instead of going to France, 
however, he only went to Stirling Castle. 

Darnley, finding that he could not accom- 
plish his aims by such methods as these, wrote, 
it is said, to the Catholic governments of Eu- 
rope, proposing that, if they would cooperate/ 
in putting him into power in Scotland, he 
would adopt efficient measures for changing 
the religion of the country from the Protes- 
tant to the Catholic faith. He made, too, 
every effort to organize a party in his favor in 
Scotland, and tried to defeat and counteract 
the influence of Mary's government by every 
means in his power. These things, and other 
trials and difficulties connected with them, 
weighed very heavily upon Mary's mind. She 
sunk gradually into a state of great dejection 
and despondency. She spent many hours 
in sighing and in tears, and often wished that 
she was in her grave. 

So deeply, in fact, was Mary plunged into dis- 
tress and trouble by the state of things existing 
between herself and Darnley, that some of her 
officers of government began to conceive of a 
plan of having her divorced from him. After 
looking at this subject in all its bearings, and 



BOTHWELL. ^^^ 

consulting about it with each other they ven- 
tured, at last, to propose it to Mary She 
would not listen to any such plan. She d.d not 
think a divorce could be legally accomplished. 
And then, if it were to be done, .t would 
she feared, in some way or other, affect the 
position and r.ghts of the darling son who was 
now to her more than all the world besides. 
She would rather endure to the end other days 
the tyranny and torment she exper enced rom 
her b'rutal husband, than hazard "j J^ J^^ 
degree the future greatness «"d gory of the 
infant who was lying in his cradle before her 
equally unconscious of the grandeur which 
awaited him in future years, and of the 
strength of the maternal love which was smil- 
ng ^pon him from amid such sorrow and 
teL, and extending over him such gentle, but 
determined and effectual protection^ 

The sad and sorrowful feelings which Mary 
endured were interrupted for a little time by 
the splendid pageant of the baptism of h^= 
child. Ambassadors came from all the im 
portant courts of the Continent to do honor to 
the occasion. Elizabeth sent the Earl of Bed 
ford as her ambassador, with a present of a 
baptismal font of gold, which l^^d cost a sum 
equal to five thousand dollars. The bapt.srn 
took place at Stirling, in December, wrth every 
possible accompaniment of pomp and parade, 



140 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

and was followed by many days of festivitiel 
and rejoicing. The whole country were inter* 
ested in the event except Darnley, who de- 
clared sullenly, while the preparations were 
making, that he should not remain to witness 
the ceremony, but should go off a day or two 
before the appointed time. 

The ceremony was performed in the chapel. 
The child was baptized under the names of 
"Charles James, James Charles, Prince and 
Steward of Scotland, Duke of Rothesay, Earl 
of Carrick, Lord of the Isles, and Baron of 
Renfrew.'' His subsequent designation in 
history was James Sixth of Scotland and First 
of England. A great many appointments of 
attendants and officers, to be attached to the 
service of the young prince, were made im- 
mediately, most of them, of course, mere 
matters of parade. Among the rest, five ladies 
of distinction were constituted ''rockers of his 
cradle." The form of the young prince's 
cradle has come down to us in an ancient 
drawing. 

In due time after the coronation, the various 
ambassadors and delegates returned to their 
respective courts, carrying back glowing 
accounts of the ceremonies and festivities 
attendant upon the christening, and of the 
grace, and beauty, and loveliness of the queen. 

In the mean time, Bothwell and Murray 



BOTHWELL. I4l 

were competitors for the confidence and re- 
gard of the queen, and it began to seem prob- 
able that Both well would win the day. Mary, 
in one of her excursions, was traveling in the 
southern part of the country, when she heard 
that he had been wounded in an encounter 
with a party of desperadoes near the border. 
Moved partly, perhaps, by compassion, and 




partly by gratitude for his services, Mary 
made an expedition across the country to pay 
him a visit. Some say that she was animated 
by a more powerful motive than either of 
these. In fact this, as well as almost all the 
other acts of Mary's life, are presented in very 
different lights by her friends and her enemies. 
The former say that this visit to her lieutenant 
in his confinement from a wound received in 
her service was perfectly proper, both in the 



142 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

design itself, and in all the circumstances of 
its execution. The latter represent it as an 
instance of highly indecorous eagerness on the 
part of a married lady to express to another 
man a sympathy and kind regard which she 
had ceased to feel for her husband. 

Bothwell himself was married as well as 
Mary. He had been married but a few months 
to a beautiful lady a few years younger than 
the queen. The question, however, whether 
Mary did right or wrong in paying this visit 
to him, is not, after all, a very important one. 
There is no doubt that she and Bothwell loved 
each other before they ought to have done so, 
and it is of comparatively little consequence 
when the attachment began. The end of it is 
certain. Bothwell resolved to kill Darnley, to 
get divorced from his own wife, and to marry 
the queen. The world has never yet settled 
the question whether she was herself his ac- 
complice or not in the measures he adopted 
for effecting these plans, or whether she only 
submitted to the result when Bothwell, by his 
own unaided efforts, reached it. Each reader 
must judge of this question for himself from 
the facts about to be narrated. 

Bothwell first communicated with the nobles 
about the court, to get their consent and ap- 
probation to the destruction of the king. They 
all appeared to be very willing to have the 



BOTHWELL. 143 

thing done, but were a little cautious about 
involving themselves in the responsibility of 
doing it. Darnley was thoroughly hated, 
despised, and shunned by them all. Still they 
were afraid of the consequences of taking his 
life. One of them, Morton, asked Bothwell 
what the queen would think of the plan. 
Bothwell said that the queen approved of it. 
Morton replied, that if Bothwell would show 
him an expression of the queen's approval of 
the plot, in her own handwriting, he would 
join it, otherwise not. Bothwell failed to 
furnish this evidence, saying that the queen 
was really privy to, and in favor of the plan, 
but that it was not to be expected that she 
would commit herself to- it in writing. Was 
this all true, or was the pretense only a des- 
perate measure of Bothwell's to induce Morton 
to join him ? 

Most of the leading men about the court, 
however, either joined the plot, or so far gave 
it their countenance and encouragement as to 
induce Bothwell to proceed. There were many 
and strange rumors about Darnley. One was, 
that he was actually going to leave the coun- 
try, and that a ship was ready for him in the 
Clyde. Another was, that he had a plan for 
seizing the young prince, dethroning Mary, and 
reigning himself in her stead, in the prince's 
nam?. Other strange and desperate schemes 



144 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

were attributed to him. In the midst of them, 
news came to INIary at Holyrood that he was 
taken suddenly and dangerously sick at Glas- 
gow, where he was then residing, and she im- 
mediately went to see him. Was her motive 
a desire to make one more attempt to win his 
confidence and love, and to divert him from the 
desperate measures which she feared he was 
contemplating, or was she acting as an ac- 
complice with Bothwell, to draw him into the 
snare in which he was afterward taken and 
destroyed ? 

The result of Mary's visit to her husband, 
after some time spent with him in Glasgow, 
was a proposal that he should return with her 
to Edinburgh, where she could watch over him 
during his convalescence with greater care. 
This plan was adopted. He was conveyed on 
a sort of litter, by very slow and easy stages, 
toward Edinburgh. He was on such terms 
with the nobles and lords in attendance upon 
Mary that he was not willing to go to Holy- 
rood House. Besides, his disorder was con- 
tagious : it is supposed to have been the small- 
pox ; and though he was nearly recovered, 
there was still some possibility that the royal 
babe might take the infection if the patient 
came within the same walls with him. So 
Mary sent forward to Edinburgh to have a 
house provided for him, 



BOTHWBLL. 



146 



The situation of this house is seen near the 
city wall on the left, in the accompanying view 
of Edinburgh. Holyrood House is the large 
square edifice in the foreground, and the castle 
crowns the hill in the distance. There is now, 
as there was in the days of Mary, a famous 
street extending from Holyrood House to the 
castle, called, the Cannon Gate at the lower 
end, and the High Street above. This street, 
with the castle at one extremity and Holyrood 
House at the other, were the scenes of many 
of the most remarkable events described in 
this narrative. 

The residence selected was a house of four 
rooms, close upon the city wall. The place 
was called the Kirk of Field, from a kirk, or 
church, which formerly stood near there, in 
the fields. 

This house had two rooms upon the lower 
floor, with a passageway between them. One 
of these rooms was a kitchen ; the other was 
appropriated to Mary's use, whenever she was 
able to be at the place in attendance upon her 
husband. Over the kitchen was a room used 
as a wardrobe and for servants ; and over 
Mary's room was the apartment for Darnley. 
There was an opening through the city wall in 
the rear of this dwelling, by which there was 
access to the kitchen. These premises were 
fitted up for Darnley in the most thorough man- 



146 



MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 



ner. A bath was arranged for him in his apart- 
ment, and everything was done which could 
conduce to his comfort, according to the ideas 
which then prevailed. Darnley was brought 
to Edinburgh, conveyed to this house, and 
quietly established there. 

The following is a plan of the house in which 
Darnley was lodged : 




Fields. 

M. Mary's room, below Darnley's. K. Kitchen ; servants' room above. 
O. Passage through the city wall into the kitchen. S. Stair-case leading 
to the second story. P. Passage-way. 

The accommodations in this house do not 
seem to have been very sumptuous, after all, 
for a royal guest ; but royal dwellings in Scot- 



BOTHWELL. 147 

land, in those days, were not what they are 
now in Westminster and at St. Cloud. 

The day for the execution of the plan, which 
was, to blow up the house where the sick Darn- 
ley was lying, with gunpowder, approached. 
Bothwell selected a number of desperate char- 
acters to aid him in the actual work to be done. 
One of these was a Frenchman, w^ho had been 
for a long time in his service, and who went 
commonly by the name of French Paris. Both- 
well contrived to get French Paris taken into 
Mary's service a few days before the murder of 
Darnley, and, through him, he got possession 
of some of the keys of the house which Darn- 
ley was occupying, and thus had duplicates of 
them made, so that he had access to every 
part of the house. The gunpowder was brought 
from Bothwell's castle at Dunbar, and all was 
ready. 

Mary spent m.uch of her time at Darnley's 
house, and often slept in the room beneath his, 
which had been allotted to her as her apart- 
ment. One Sunday there was to be a wedding 
at Holyrood. The bride and bridegroom were 
favorite servants of Mary's, and she was in- 
tending to be present at the celebration of the 
nuptials. She was to leave Darnley's early in 
the evening for this purpose. Her enemies 
say that this was all a concerted arrangement 
between her and Bothwell to give him the op- 



148 MARY QUEEN OP SCOTS. 

portunity to execute his plan. Her friends, on 
the other hand, insist that she knew nothing 
about it, and that Bothwell had to watch and 
wait for such an opportunity of blowing up 
the house without injuring Mary. Be this as 
it may, the Sunday of this wedding was fixed 
upon for the consummation of the deed. 

The gunpowder had been secreted in Both- 
well's rooms at the palace. On Sunday eve- 
ning, as soon as it was dark, Bothwell set the 
men at work to transport the gunpowder. 
They brought it out in bags from the palace, 
and then employed a horse to transport it to 
the wall of some gardens which were in the 
rear of Darnley's house. They had to go 
twice with the horse in order to convey all the 
gunpowder that they had provided. While 
this was going on, Bothwell, who kept out of 
sight, was walking to and fro in an adjoining 
street, to receive intelligence, from time to 
time, of the progress of the affair, and to issue 
orders. The gunpowder was conveyed across 
the gardens to the rear of the house, taken in 
at a back door, and deposited in the room 
marked J/ in the plan, which was the room 
belonging to Mary. Mary was all this time 
directly overhead, in Darnley's chamber. 

The plan of the conspirators was to put the 
bags of gunpowder into a cask which they had 
provided for the occasion, to keep the mass 



BOTHWELIi. 



149 



together, and increase the force of the explo- 
sion. The cask had been provided, and placed 
in the gardens behind the house ; but, on at- 
tempting to take it into the house, they found 
it too big to pass through the back door. This 
caused considerable delay; and Bothwell, 
growing impatient, came, with his character- 
istic impetuosity, to ascertain the cause. By 
his presence and his energy, he soon remedied 
the difficulty in some way or other, and com- 
pleted the arrangements. The gunpowder 
was all deposited ; the men were dismissed, 
except two who were left to watch, and who 
were locked up with the gunpowder in Mary's 
room ; and then, all things being ready for the 
explosion as soon as Mary should be gone, 
Bothwell walked up to Darnley's room above, 
and joined the party who were supping there. 
The cool' effrontery of this proceeding has 
scarcely a parallel in the annals of crime. 

At eleven o'clock Mary rose to go, saying 
she must return to the palace to take part, as 
she had promised to do, in the celebration of 
her servants' wedding. Mary took leave of 
her husband in a very affectionate manner, 
and went away in company with Bothwell and 
the other nobles. Her enemies maintain that 
she was privy to all the arrangements which 
had been made, and that she did not go into 
her own apartment below, knowing very well 



150 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

what was there. But even if we imagine that 
Mary was aware of the general plan of de- 
stroying her husband, and was secretly pleased 
with it, as almost any royal personage that 
ever lived, under such circumstances, would 
be, we need not admit that she was acquainted 
with the details of the mode by which the 
plan was to be put in execution, The most 
that we can suppose such a man as Bothwell 
would have communicated to her, would be 
some dark and obscure intimations of his de- 
sign, made in order to satisfy himself that she 
would not really oppose it. To ask her, 
woman as she was, to take any part in such 
a deed, or to communicate to her beforehand 
any of the details of the arrangement, would 
have been an act of littleness and meanness 
which such magnanimous monsters as Both- 
well are seldom guilty of. 

Besides, Mary remarked that evening, in 
Darnley's room, in the course of conversation, 
that it was just about a year since Rizzio's 
death. On entering her palace, too, at Holy- 
rood, that night, she met one of Bothwell's 
servants who had been carrying the bags, and, 
perceiving the smell of gunpowder, she asked 
him what it meant. Now Mary was not the 
brazen-faced sort of woman to speak of such 
things at such a time if she was really in the 
councils of the conspirators. The only ques- 



BOTH WELL. 151 

tion seems to be, therefore, not whether she 
was a party to the actual deed of murder, but 
only whether she was aware of, and consent- 
ing to, the general design. 

In the mean time, Mary and Bothwell went 
together into the hall where the servants were 
rejoicing and making merry at the wedding. 
French Paris was there, but his heart began to 
fail him in respect to the deed in which he had 
been engaged. He stood apart, with a coun- 
tenance expressive of anxiety and distress. 
Bothwell went to him, and told him that if he 
carried such a melancholy face as that any 
longer in the presence of the queen, he would 
make him suffer for it. The poor conscience- 
stricken man begged .Bothwell to release him 
from any further part in the transaction. He 
was sick, really sick, he said, and he wanted 
to go home to his bed. Bothwell made no re- 
ply but to order him to follow him. Bothwell 
went to his own rooms, changed the silken 
court dress in which he had appeared in com- 
pany for one suitable to the night and to the 
deed, directed his men to follow him, and 
passed from the palace toward the gates of the 
city. The gates were shut, for it was mid- 
night. The sentinels challenged them. The 
party said they were friends to my Lord Both- 
well, and were allowed to pass on. 

They advanced to the convent gardens. 



152 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

Here they left a part of their number, while 
Bothwell and French Paris passed over the 
wall, and crept softly into the house. They 
unlocked the room where they had left the two 
watchmen with the gunpowder, and found 
all safe. Men locked up under such circum- 
stances, and on the eve of the perpetration of 
such a deed, were not likely to sleep at their 
posts. All things being now ready, they made 
a slow match of lint, long enough to burn for 
some little time, and inserting one end of it into 
the gunpowder, they lighted the other end, and 
crept stealthily out of the apartment. They 
passed over the wall into the convent gardens, 
where they rejoined their companions and 
awaited the result. 

Men choose midnight often for the perpetra- 
tion of crime, from the facilities afforded by its 
silence and solitude. This advantage is, how- 
ever, sometimes well-nigh balanced by the 
stimulus which its mysterious solemnity 
brings to the stings of remorse and terror. 
Bothwell himself felt anxious and agitated. 
They waited and waited, but it seemed as if 
their dreadful suspense would never end. 
Bothwell became desperate. He wanted to get 
overthe wall again and look in at the window, 
to see if the slow match had not gone out. 
The rest restrained him. At length the explo- 
sion came like a clap of thunder. The flash 



BOTHWELL. 153 

brightened for an instant over the whole sky, 
and the report roused the sleeping inhabitants 
of Edinburgh from their slumbers, throwing 
the whole city into sudden consternation. 

The perpetrators of the deed, finding that 
their work was done, fled immediately. They 
tried various plans to avoid the sentinels at the 
gates of the city, as well as the persons who 
were beginning to come toward the scene of 
the explosion. When they reached the palace 
of Holyrood, they were challenged by the sen- 
tinel on duty there. They said that they were 
friends of Earl Bothwell, bringing despatches to 
him from the country. The sentinel asked them 
if they knew what was the cause of that loud 
explosion. They said they did not, and passed 
on. 

Bothwell went to his room, called for a drink, 
undressed himself and went to bed. Half an 
hour afterward, messengers came to awaken 
him, and inform him that the king's house had 
been blown up with gunpowder, and the king 
himself killed by the explosion. He rose with 
an appearance of great astonishment and in- 
dignation, and, after conferring with some of 
the other nobles, concluded to go and commu- 
nicate the event to the queen. The queen was 
overwhelmed with astonishment and indigna- 
tion too. 

The destruction of Darnley in such a manner 

12-Mary 



154 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

as this, of course produced a vast sensation all 
over Scotland. Everybody was on the alert 
to discover the authors of the crime. Rewards 
were offered ; proclamations were made. Ru- 
mors began to circulate that Bothwell was the 
criminal. He was accused by anonymous 
placards put up at night in Edinburgh. Len- 
nox, Darnley's father, demanded his trial ; and 
a trial was ordered. The circumstances of the 
trial were such, however, and Bothwell's power 
and desperate recklessness were so great, that 
Lennox, when the time came, did not appear. 
He said he had not /brce enough at his com- 
mand to come safely into court. There being 
no testimony offered, Bothwell was acquitted ; 
and he immediately afterward issued his proc- 
lamation, offering to fight any man who should 
intimate, in any way, that he was concerned 
in the murder of the king. Thus Bothwell es- 
tablished his innocence ; at least, no man dared 
to gainsay it. 

Darnley was murdered in F'ebruary. Both- 
well was tried and acquitted in April. Imme- 
diately afterwards, he took measures for pri- 
vately making known to the leading nobles that 
it was his design to marry the queen, and for 
securing their concurrence in the plan. They 
concurred ; or at least, perhaps for fear of dis- 
pleasing such a desperado, said what he under- 
stood to mean that they concurred. The queen 



feOTHWELL. 156 

heard the reports of such a design, and said, as 
ladies often do in similar cases, that she did 
not know what people meant by such reports ; 
there was no foundation for them whatever. 

Toward the end of April, Mary was about 
returning from the castle of Stirling to Edin- 
burgh with a small escort of troops and attend- 
ants. Melville was in her train. Bolhwell 
set out at the head of a force of more than five 
hundred men to intercept her. Mary lodged 
one night, on her way, at Linlithgow, the pal- 
ace where she was born, and the next morning 
was quietly pursuing her journey, when Both- 
well came up at the head of his troops. Re- 
sistance was vain. Bothwell advanced to 
Mary's horse, and, taking the bridle, led her 
away. A few of her principal followers were 
taken prisoners too, and the rest were dis- 
missed. Bothwell took his captive across the 
country by a rapid flight to his castle of Dun- 
bar. The attendants who were taken with her 
were released, and she remained in the Castle 
of Dunbar for ten days, entirely in Bothwell's 
power. 

According to the account which Mary her- 
self gives of what took place during this cap- 
tivity, she at first reproached Bothwell bitterly 
for the ungrateful and cruel return he was mak- 
ing for all her kindness to him, by such a deed 
of violence and wrong, and begged and en- 



156 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

treated him to let her go. Bothwell replied 
that he knew that it was wrong for him to treat 
his sovereign so rudely, but that he was im- 
pelled to it by the circumstances of the case, 
and by love which he felt for her, which was 
too strong for him to control. He then en- 
treated her to become his wife ; he complained 
of the bitter hostility which he had always been 
subject to from his enemies, and that he could 
have no safeguard from this hostility in time to 
come, but in her favor ; and he could not de- 
pend npon any assurance of her favor less than 
her making him her husband. He protested 
that, if she would do so, he would never ask 
to share her power, but would be content to 
be her faithful and devoted servant, as he had 
always been. It was love, not ambition, he 
said, that animated him, and he could not and 
would not be refused. Mary says that she was 
distressed and agitated beyond measure by 
the appeals and threats with which Bothwell 
accompanied his urgent entreaties. She tried 
every way to plan some mode of escape. No- 
body came to her rescue. She was entirely 
alone, and in BothwelFs power. Bothwell as- 
sured her that the leading nobles of her court 
were in favor of the marriage, and showed her 
a written agreement signed by them to this 
effect. At length, wearied and exhausted, she 
was finally overcome by his urgency, and 



BOTHWELL. 167 

yielding partly to his persuasions, and partly, 
as she says, to force, gave herself up to his 
power. 

Mary remained at Dunbar about ten days, 
during which time Bothwell sued out and ob- 
tained a divorce from his wife. His wife, feel- 
ing, perhaps, resentment more than grief, sued, 
at the same time, for a divorce from him. 
Bothwell then sallied forth from his fastness at 
Dunbar, and, taking Mary with him, went to 
Edinburgh, and took up his abode in the cas- 
tle there, as that fortress was then under his 
power. Mary soon after appeared in public, 
and stated that she was now entirely free, and 
that, although Bothwell had done wrong in 
carrying her away by violence, still he had 
treated her since in so respectful a manner, 
that she had pardoned him, and had received 
him into favor again. A short time after this 
they were married. The ceremony was per- 
formed in a very private and unostentatious 
manner, and took place in May, about three 
months after the murder of Darnley. 

By some persons Mary's account of the trans- 
actions at Dunbar is believed. Others think 
that the whole affair was all a preconcerted 
plan, and that the appearance of resistance on 
her part was only forshov/, to justify, in some 
degree, in the eyes of the world, so imprudent 
and inexcusable a marriage. A great many 



158 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

volumes have been written on the question, 
without making any progress toward a settle- 
ment of it. It is one of those cases where, the 
evidence beingconiplicated, conflicting, andin- 




Edinburgh Castle. 
complete, the mind is swayed by the feelings, 
and the readers of the story decide more or less 
favorably for the unhappy queen, according to 
the warmth of the interest awakened in their 
hearts by beauty and misfortune. 




CHAPTER IX. 



THE FALL OF BOTHWELL. 

The course which Mary pursued after her 
liberation from Dunbar in yielding to Both- 
well's wishes, pardoning his violence, receiving 
him again into favor, and becoming his wife, 
is one of the most extraordinary instances of the 
infatuation produced by .love that has ever oc- 
curred. If the story had been fiction instead 
of truth, it would have been pronounced ex- 
travagant and impossible. As it was, the 
whole country was astonished and confounded 
at such a rapid succession of desperate and un- 
accountable crimes. Mary herself seems to 
have been hurried through these terrible scenes 
in a sort of delirium of excitement, produced by 
the strange circumstances of the case, and the 
wild and uncontrollable agitations to which 
they gave rise. 

Such was, however, at the time, and such 
continues to be still, the feeling of interest in 
Mary's character and misfortunes, that but few 
open and direct censures of her conduct were 



160 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

then, or have been since, expressed. People 
execrated Bothwell, but they were silent in re- 
spect to Mary. It was soon plain, however, 
that she had greatly sunk in their regard, and 
that the more they reflected upon the circum- 
stances of the case, the deeper she was sinking. 
When the excitement, too, began to pass away 
from her own mind, it left behind it a gnawing 
inquietude and sense of guilt, which grew grad- 
ually more and more intense, until, at length, 
she sunk under the stings of remorse and 
despair. 

Her sufferings were increased by the evi- 
dences which were continually coming to her 
mind of the strong degree of disapprobation 
with which her conduct began soon every- 
where to be regarded. Wherever Scotchmen 
traveled, they found themselves reproached 
with the deeds of violence and crime of which 
their country had been the scene. Mary's rela- 
tives and friends in France wrote to her express- 
ing their surprise and grief at such proceedings. 
The King of France had sent, a short time be- 
fore, a special ambassador for the purpose of 
doing something, if possible, to discover and 
punish the murderers of Darnley. His name 
was Le Croc. He was an aged and venerable 
man, of great prudence and discretion, well 
qualified to discover and pursue the way of 
escape from the difficulties in which Mary had 



THE FALL OF BOTHWELL. 161 

involved herself, if any such way could be 
found. He arrived before the day of Mary's 
marriage, but he refused to take any part, or 
even to be present, at the ceremony. 

In the meantime, Bothwell continued in 
Edinburgh Castle for a while, under the pro- 
tection of a strong guard. People considered 
this guard as intended to prevent Mary's es- 
cape, and many thought that she was detained, 
after all, against her will, and that her admis- 
sions that she was free were only made at the 
instigation of Bothwell, and from fear of his 
terrible power. The other nobles and the 
people of Scotland began to grow more and 
more uneasy. The fear of Bothwell began to 
be changed into hatred, and the more power- 
ful nobles commenced forming plans for com- 
bining together, and rescuing, as they said, 
Mary out of his power. 

Bothwell made no attempts to conciliate 
them. He assumed an air and tone of defiance. 
He increased his forces. He conceived the plan 
of going to Stirling Castle to seize the young 
prince, who was residing there under the charge 
of persons to whom his education had been in- 
trusted. He said to his followers that James 
should never do anything to avenge his father's 
death, if he could once get him into his hands. 
The other nobles formed a league to counteract 
these designs. They began to assemble their 



162 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

forces, and everything threatened an outbreak 
of civil vv^ar. 

The marriage took place about the middle 
of May, and within a fortnight from that time 
the lines began to be pretty definitely drawn 
between the two great parties, the queen and 
Bothwell on one side, and the insurgent nobles 
on the other, each party claiming to be friends 
of the queen. Whatever was done on Both- 
welFs side was, of course, in the queen's name, 
though it is very doubtful how far she was re- 
sponsible for what was done, or how far, on the 
other hand, she merely aided, under the influ- 
ence of a species of compulsion, in carrying into 
execution Bothwell's measures. We must say, 
in narrating the history, that the queen did 
this and that, and must leave the reader to 
judge whether it was herself, or Bothwell act- 
ing through her, who was the real agent in the 
transactions described. 

Stirling Castle, where the young prince was 
residing, is northwest of Edinburgh. The con- 
federate lords were assembling in that vicinity. 
The border country between England and Scot- 
land is of course south. In the midst of this 
border country is the ancient town of Melrose, 
where there was, in former days, a very rich 
and magnificent abbey, the ruins of which, to 
this day, form one of the most attractive ob- 
jects of iqter^st in the whole island of Great 



THE TALL OE^ BOTHWELL. 16B 

Britain. The region is now the abode of peace, 
and quietness, and plenty, though in Mary's 
day it was the scene of continual turmoil and 
war. It is now the favorite retreat of poets and 
philosophers, who seek their residences there 
on account of its stillness and peace. Sir 
Walter Scotfs Abbotsford is a few miles from 
Melrose. 

About a fortnight after Mary's marriage, she 
issued a proclamation ordering the military 
chiefs in her kingdom to assemble at Melrose, 
with their followers, to accompany her on an 
expedition through the border country, to sup- 
press some disorders there. The nobles con- 
sidered this as only a scheme of Bothwell's to 
draw them away from the neighborhood of 
Stirling, so that he might go and get possession 
of the young prince. Rumors of this spread 
around the country, and the forces, instead of 
proceeding to Melrose, began to assemble in 
the neighborhood of Stirling, for the protection 
of the prince. The lords und' r whose banners 
they gathered assumed the name of /Ae^rmc^'s 
lords, and they called upon the people to take 
up arms in defense of young James's person and 
rights. The prince's lords soon began to con- 
centrate their forces about Edinburgh, and 
Bothwell was alarmed for his safety. He had 
reason to fear that the governor of Edinburgh 
Castle was on their side, and that he might sud- 



164 MARY QUEEN OP SCOTS. 

denly sally forth with a body of his forces down 
the High Street to Holyrood, and take him 
prisoner. He accordingly began to think it 
necessary to retreat. 

Now Bothwell had, among his other posses- 
sions, a certain castle called Borthwick Castle, 
a few miles south of Edinburgh. It was sit- 
uated on a little swell of land in a beautiful 
valley. It was surrounded with groves of 
trees, and from the windows and walls of the 
castle there was an extended view over the 
beautiful and fertile fields of the valley. This 
castle was extensive and strong. It consisted 
of one great square tower, surrounded and pro- 
tected by walls and bastions, and was ap- 
proached by a drawbridge. In the sudden 
emergency in which Bothwell found himself 
placed, this fortress seemed to be the most 
convenient and the surest retreat. On the 6th 
of June, he accordingly left Edinburgh with as 
large a force as he had at command, and rode 
rapidly across the country with the queen, 
and established himself at Borthwick. 

The prince's lords, taking fresh courage 
from the evidence of Bothwell's weakness and 
fear, immediately marched from Stirling, 
passed by Edinburgh, and almost immediately 
after Bothwell and the queen had got safely, 
as they imagined, established in the place of 
their retreat, they found their castle surrounded 



THE PALL OP BOTHWELL. 166 

and hemmed in on all sides by hostile forces, 
which filled the whole valley. The castle was 
strong, but not strong enough to withstand a 
siege from such an army. Bothwell accord- 
ingly determined to retreat to his castle of 
Dunbar, which, being on a rocky promontory, 
jutting into the sea, and more remote from the 
heart of the country, was less accessible, and 
more safe than Borthwick. He contrived, 
^though with great difficulty, to make his 
escape with the queen, through the ranks of 
his enemies. It is said that the queen was 
disguised in male attire. At any rate, they 
made their escape, they reached Dunbar, and 
Mary, or Bothwell in her name, immediately 
issued a proclamation, calling upon all her 
faithful subjects to assemble in arms, to deliver 
her from her dangers. At the same time, the 
prince's lords issued /Zfez'r proclamation, calling 
upon all faithful subjects to assemble with 
them, to aid them in delivering the queen 
from the tyrant who held her captive. 

The faithful subjects were at a loss which 
proclamation to obey. By far the greater 
number joined the insurgents. Some thou- 
sands, however, went to Dunbar. With this 
force the queen and Bothwell sallied forth, 
about the middle of June, to meet the prince's 
lords, or the insurgents, as they called them, 
to settle the question at issue by the kind of 



166 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

ballot with which such questions were gener- 
ally settled in those days. , 

Mary had a proclamation read at the head 
of her army, now that she supposed she was 
on the eve of battle, in which she explained 
the causes of the quarrel. The proclamation 
stated that the marriage was Mary's free act, 
and that, although it was in some respects an 
extraordinary one, still the circumstances were 
such that she could not do otherwise than she 
had done. For ten days she had been in 
Bothwell's power in his castle at Dunbar, and 
not an arm had been raised for her deliver- 
ance. Her subjects ought to have interposed 
then, if they were intending really to rescue 
her from Bothwell's power. They had done 
nothing then, but now, when she had been 
compelled, by the cruel circumstances of her 
condition, to marry Bothwell — when the act 
was done, and could no longer be recalled, 
they had taken up arms against her, and 
compelled her to take the field in her own 
defense. 

The army of the prince's lords, with Mary's 
most determined enemies at their head, ad- 
vanced to meet the queen's forces. The queen 
finally took her post on an elevated piece of 
ground called Carberry Hill. Carberry is an 
old Scotch name for gooseberry. Carberry 
Hill is a few miles to the eastward of Edin- 



THE FALL OF BOTHWELL. 167 

burgh, near Dalkeith. Here the two armies 
were drawn up, opposite to each other, in 
hostile array. ' 

Le Croc, the aged and venerable French 
ambassador, made a great effort to effect an 
accommodation and prevent a battle. He 
first went to the queen and obtained authority 
from her to offer terms of peace, and then 
went to the camp of the prince's lords and 
proposed that they should lay down their arms 
and submit to the queen's authority, and that 
she would forgive and forget what they had 
done. They replied that they had done no 
wrong, and asked for no pardon ; that they 
were not in arms against the queen's authority, 
but in favor of it. They sought only to deliver 
her from the durance in which she was held, 
and to bring to punishment the murderers 
of her husband, whoever they might be. Le 
Croc went back and forth several times, vainly 
endeavoring to effect an accommodation, and 
finally, giving up in despair, he returned to 
Edinburgh, leaving the contending parties to 
settle the contest in their own way. 

Bothwell now sent a herald to the camp of 
his enemies, challenging any one of them to 
meet him, and settle the question of his guilt 
or innocence by single combat. This proposi- 
tion was not quite so absurd in those days as 
it would be now, fbr it was not an uncommon 



168 MARY QUEEN* OF SCOTS. 

thing, in the Middle Ages, to try in this way 
questions of crime. Many negotiations ensued 
on Bothvvell's proposal. One or two persons 
expressed themselves ready to accept the chal- 
lenge. Both well objected to them on account 
of their rank being inferior to his, but said he 
would fight Morton, if Morton would accept his 
challenge. Morton had been his accomplice 
in the murder of Darnley, but had afterward 
joined the party of Bothwell's foes. • It would 
have been a singular spectacle to see one of 
these confederates in the commission of a crime 
contending desperately in single combat to 
settle the question of the guilt or innocence of 
the ether. 

/The combat, however, did not take place./ 
After many negotiations on the subject, the 
plan was abandoned, each party charging the 
other with declining the contest. The queen 
and Bothwell, in the mean time, found such 
evidences of strength on the part of their ene-" 
mies, and felt probably, in their own hearts, so 
much of that faintness and misgiving under 
which human energy almost always sinks 
when the tide begins to turn against it, after 
the commission of wrong, that they began to 
feel disheartened and discouraged. The queen 
sent to the opposite camp with a request that 
a certain personage, the Laird of Grange, in 
whom all parties had great confidence, should 



THE FALL OF BOTHWELL. 



169 



come to her, that she might make one more 
effort at reconciliation. Grange, after con- 
sulting with the prince's lords, made a prop- 
osition to Mary, which she finally concluded 
to accept. It was as follows : 

They proposed that Mary should come over 
to their camp, not saying very distinctly 
whether she was to come as their captive or 
as their queen. The event showed that it was 
in the former capacity that they intended to 
receive her, though they were probably willing 
that she should understand that it was in the 
latter. At all events, the proposition itself 
did not make it very clear what her position 
would be ; and the poor queen, distracted by 
the difficulties which surrounded her, and 
overwhelmed with agitation and fear, could 
not press very strongly for precise stipulations. 
In respect to Bothwell, they compromised the 
question by agreeing that, as he was under sus- 
picion in respect to the murder of Darnley, he 
should not accompany the queen, but should 
be dismissed upon the field ; that is, allowed 
to depart, without molestation, wherever he 
should choose to go. This plan was finally 
adopted. The queen bade Bothwell farewell, 
and he went away reluctantly and in great 
apparent displeasure./ He, had, in fact, with 
his characteristic ferocity, attempted to shoot 
Grange pending the negotiation. He mounted 

13-Marr 



170 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

his horse, and, with a few attendants, rode off 
and sought a retreat once more upon his rock 
at Dunbar. 

From all the evidence which has come down 
to us, it seems impossible to ascertain whether 
Mary desired to be released from Bothwell's 
power, and was glad when the release came, 
or whether she still loved him, and was plan- 
ning a reunion, so soon as a reunion should be 
possible. One party at that time maintained, 
and a large class of writers and readers since 
have concurred in the opinion, that ]\Iary was 
in love with Bothwell before Darnley's death ; 
that she connived with him in the plan for 
Darnley's murder ; that she was a consenting 
party to the abduction, and the spending of 
the ten days at Dunbar Castle, in his power ; 
that the marriage was the end at w^hich she 
herself, as well as Bothwell, had been all the 
time aiming ; and then, when at last she sur- 
rendered herself to the prince's lords at Car- 
berry Hill, it was only yielding unwillingly to 
the necessity of a temporary separation from 
her lawless husband, with a view of reinstat- 
ing him in favor and power at the earliest 
opportunity. 

Another party, both among her people at the 
time and among the writers and readers who 
have since paid attention to her story, think 
that she never loved Bothwell, and that, though 




^K imf&^^^^ 



Mary, face p. ilO 



Surrender of Mary, Queen of Scots, at Carberry Hill. 



THE FALL OF BOTH WELL. 171 

she valued his services as a bold and energetic 
soldier, she had no collusion with him what- 
ever in respect to Darnley's murder. They 
think that, though she must have felt in some 
sense relieved of a burden by Darnley's death, 
she did not fn any degree aid in or justify the 
crime, and that she had no reason for suppos- 
ing that Bothwell had any share in the com- 
mission of it. They thinlc, also, vhat her 
consenting to marry Bothwell is to be account- 
ed for by her natural desire to seek shelter, 
under some wing or other, from the terrible 
storms which were raging around her ; and 
being deserted, as she thought, by everybody 
else, and moved by his passionate love and 
devotion, she imprudently gave herself to him ; 
that she lamented the act as soon as it was 
done, but that it was then too late to retrieve 
the step ; and that, harassed and in despair, 
she knew not what to do, but that she hailed 
the rising of her nobles as affording the only 
promise of deliverance, and came forth from 
Dunbar to meet them with the secret purpose 
of delivering herself into their hands. 

The question which of these two supposi- 
tions is the correct one .has been discussed a 
great deal, without the possibility of arriving at 
any satisfactory conclusion. A parcel of let- 
ters were produced by Mary's enemies, some 
time after this, which they said were Mary's 



172 MARY QtJEElJ.Ol* SCOTS. 

letters to Bothwell before her husband Darn- 
ley's death. They say they took the letters 
from a man named Dalgleish, one of Bothwell s 
servants, who was carrying them from Holy- 
rood to Dunbar Castle, just after Mary and 
Bothwell fled to Borthwick. They were con- 
tained in a small gilded box or coffer, with the 
letter F upon it, under a crown ; which mark 
naturally suggests to our minds Mary's first 
husband, Francis, the king of France. Dal- 
gleish said that Bothwell sent him for this box, 
charging him to convey it with all care to Dun- 
bar Castle. The letters purport to be from 
Mary to Bothwell, and to have been written 
before Darnley's death. They evince a strong 
affection for the person to whom they are ad- 
dressed, and seem conclusively to prove the 
unlawful attachment between the parties, pro- 
vided that their genuineness is acknowledged. 
But this genuineness is denied. Mary's friends 
maintain that they are forgeries, prepared by 
her enemies to justify their own wrong. Many 
volumes have been written on the question of 
the genuineness of these love letters, as they 
are called, and there is perhaps now no proba- 
bility that the question will ever be settled. 

Whatever doubt there may be about these 
things, there is none about the events which 
followed. After Mary had surrendered her- 
self to her nobles they took her to the camp, 



THE FALL OF BOTHWELL. 173 

she herself riding on horseback, and Grange 
walking by her side. As she advanced to meet 
the nobles who had combined against her, she 
said to them that she had concluded to come 
over to them, not from fear, or from doubt 
what the issue would have been if she had 
fought the battle, but only because she wanted 
to spare the effusion of Christian blood, espe- 
cially the blood of her own subjects. She had 
therefore decided to submit herself to their 
counsels, trusting that they would treat her as 
their rightful queen. The nobles made little 
reply to this address, but prepared to return 
to Edinburgh with their prize. 

The people of Edinburgh, who had heard 
what turn the affair had taken, flocked out 
upon the roads to see the queen return. They 
lined the wayside to gaze upon the great cav- 
alcade as it passed. The nobles who con- 
ducted Mary thus back toward her capitol had 
a banner prepared, or allowed one to be pre- 
pared, on which was a painting representing the 
dead body of Darnley, and the young prince 
James kneeling near him, and calling on God to 
avenge his cause. Mary came on, in the pro- 
cession, after this symbol. They might per- 
haps say that it was not intended to wound 
her feelings, and was not of a nature to do it, 
unless she considered herself as taking sides 
with the murderers of her husband. She, how- 



1Y4 UAHY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

ever, knew very well that she was so regarded 
by great numbers of the populace assembled, 
and that the effect of such an effigy carried be- 
fore her was to hold her up to public obloquy. 
The populace did, in fact, taunt and reproach 
her as she proceeded, and she rode into Edin- 
burgh, evincing all the way extreme mental 
suffering by her agitation and her tears. 

She expected that they were at least to take 
her to Holyrood ; but no, they turned at the gate 
to enter the city. Mary protested earnestly 
against this, and called, half frantic, on all 
who heard her to come to her rescue. But no 
one interfered. They took her to the jirovost's 
house, and lodged her there for the night, and 
the crowd which had assembled to observe 
these proceedings gradually dispersed. There 
seemed, however, in a day or two, to be some 
symptoms of a reaction in the favor of the 
fallen queen ; and, to guard against the pos- 
sibility of a rescue, the lords took Mary to Holy- 
rood again, and began immediately to make 
arrangements for some more safe place of con- 
finement still. 

In the mean time, Bothwell went from Car- 
berry Hill to his castle at Dunbar, revolving 
moodily in his mind his altered fortunes. After 
some time he found himself not safe in this 
place of refuge, and so he retreated to the 
north, to some estates he hacl there in the re- 



THE FALL OF BOTHWBLIi. 175 

mote Highlands. A detachment of forces was 
sent in pursuit of him. Now there are, north 
of Scotland, some groups of dismal islands, the 
summits of submerged mountains and rocks, 
rising in dark and sublime, but gloomy gran- 
deur, from the midst of cold and tempestuous 
seas. Both well, finding himself pursued, un- 
dertook to escape by ship to these islands. 
His pursuers, headed by Grange, who had ne- 
gotiated at Carberry for the surrender of the . 
queen, embarked in other vessels, and pressed 
on after him. At one time they almost over- 
took him, and would have captured him and 
all his company were it not that they got en- 
tangled among some shoals. Grange's sailors 
said they must not proceed. Grange, ea*ger 
to seize his prey, insisted on their making sail 
and pressing forward. The consequence was, 
they ran the vessels aground, and Bothwell 
escaped in a small boat. As it was, however, 
they seized some of his accomplices, and 
brought them back to Edinburgh. These men 
were afterward tried, and some of them were 
executed ; and it was at their trial, and through 
the confessions they made, that the facts were 
brought to light which have been related in 
this narrative. 

Bothwell, now a fugitive and an exile, but 
still retaining his desperate and lawless char- 
acter; became a pirate, and attempted to live 



176 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

by robbing the commerce of the German Ocean. 
Rumor is the only historian, in ordinary cases, 
to record the events in the life of a pirate ; and 
she, in this case, sent word, from time to time, 
to Scotland, of the robberies and murders that 
the desperado committed ; of an expedition 
fitted out against him by the King of Denmark ; 




Both well Captured by a Danish ship, 
of his being taken and carried into a Danish 
port ; of his being held in imprisonment for a 
long period there, in a gloomy dungeon ; of his 
restless spirit chafing itself in useless struggles 
against his fate, and sinking gradually, at last 
under the burdens of remorse for past crimes, 
and despair of any earthly deliverance ; of his 
insanity, and, finally, of his miserable end 




CHAPTER X. 

LOCH LEVEN CASTLE. 

Grange, or, as he is sometimes called, Kir- 
caldy, his title in full being Grange of Kircaldy, 
was a man of integrity and honor ; and he, 
having been the negotiator through whose 
intervention Mary gave herself up, felt himself 
bound to see that the .stipulations on the part 
of the nobles should be honorably fulfilled. 
He did all in his power to protect Mary from 
insult on the journey, and he struck with his 
sword and drove away some of the populace 
who were addressing her with taunts and re- 
proaches. When he found that the nobles 
were confining her, and treating her so much 
more like a captive than like a queen, he re- 
monstrated with them. They silenced him by 
showing him a letter, which they said they 
had intercepted on its way from Mary to Both- 
well. It was written, they said, on the night 
of Mary's arrival at Edinburgh. It assured 
Bothwell that she retained an unaltered affec- 
tion for him ; that her consenting to be sepa- 

X77 



178 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

rated from him at Carberry Hill was a matter 
of mere necessity, and that she should rejoin 
him as soon as it was in her power to do so. 
This letter showed, they said, that, after all, 
Mary was not, as they had supposed, Both- 
well's captive and victim, but that she was 
his accomplice and friend ; and that, now that 
they had discovered their mistake, they must 
treat Mary, as well as Bothwell, as an enemy, 
and take effectual means to protect them- 
selves from the one as well as from the other. 
Mary's friends maintain that this letter was 
a forgery. 

They accordingly took Mary, as has been 
already stated, from the provost's house in 
Edinburgh down to Holyrood House, which 
was just without the city. This, however, was 
only a temporary change. That night they 
came into the palace, and directed Mary to 
rise and put on a traveling dress which they 
brought her. They did not tell her where she 
was to go, but simply ordered her to follow 
them. It was midnight. They took her forth 
from the palace, mounted her upon a horse, 
and, with Ruthven and Lindsay, two of the 
murderers of Rizzio, for an escort, they rode 
away. They traveled all night, crossed the 
River Forth, and arrived in the morning at the 
Castle of Loch Leven. 

The Castle of Loch Leven is on a small 



LOCH LBVEN CASTLE. l79 

island in the middle of the loch. It is nearly- 
north from Edinburgh. The castle buildings 
covered at that time about one half of the 
island, the water coming up to the walls on three 
sides. On the other side was a little land, 
which was cultivated as a garden. The build- 
ings inclosed a considerable area. There was 
a great square tower, marked on the plan 
below, which was the residence of the family. 
It consisted of four or five rooms, one over the 
other. The cellar, or, rather, what would be 
the cellar in other cases, was a dungeon for 
such prisoners as were to be kept in close con- 
finement. The only entrance to this building 
was through a windo\Y in the second story, by 
means of a ladder which was raised and let 
down by a chain. This was over the point 
marked e on the plan. The chain was worked 
at a window in the story above. There were 
various other apartments and structures about 
the square, and among them there was a small 
octagonal tower in the corner at m, which 
consisted within of one room over another for 
three stories, and a flat roof with battlements 
above. In the second story there was a 
window, w, looking upon the water. This was 
the only window having an external aspect in 
the whole fortress, all the other openings in 
the exterior walls being mere loopholes and 
embrasures. 



180 



MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 



The following is a general plan of Loch Leven 
Castle : 




This castle was in possession of a certain 
personage styled the Lady Douglas. She was 
the mother of the Lord James, afterward the 
Earl of Murray, who has figured so conspicu- 
ously in this history as Mary's half brother, and 
at first her friend and counselor, though after- 
ward her foe. Lady Douglas was commonly 
called the Lady of Loch Leven. She main- 
tained that she and been lawfully married to 
James v., Mary's father, and that consequently 



LOCH LEVEN CASTLE. 181 

her son , and not Mary, was the rightful heir to 
the crown. Of course she was Mary's natural 
enemy. They selected her castle as the place 
of Mary's confinement partly on this account, 
and partly on account of its inaccessible posi- 
tion in the midst of the waters of the lake. 
They delivered the captive queen, accordingly, 
to the Lady Douglas and her husband, charg- 
ing them to keep her safely. The Lady Doug- 
las received her, and locked her up in the oc- 
tagonal tower with the window looking out 
upon the water. 

In the mean time, all Scotland took sides for 
or against the queen. The strongest party 
were against her; and the Church was agamst 
her, on account of their hostility to the Catho- 
lic religion. A sort of provisional government 
was instituted, which assumed the manage- 
ment of public affairs. Mary had, however, 
some friends, and they soon began to assem- 
ble in order to see what could be done for her 
cause. Their rendezvous was at the palace of 
. Hamilton. This palace was situated on a 
plain in the midst of a beautiful park, near the 
River Clyde, a few miles from Glasgow. The 
Duke of Hamilton was prominent among the 
supporters of the queen, and made his house 
their headquarters. They were often called, 
from this circumstance, the Hamilton lords. 
On the other hand, the party opposed to 



182 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

Mary made the castle of Stirling their head' 
quarters, because the young prince was there, 
in whose name they were proposing soon to as- 
sume the government. Their plan was to de- 
pose Mary, or induce her to abdicate the throne, 
and then to make Murray regent, to govern 
the country in the name of the prince until 
the prince should become of age. During all 
this time Murray had beeh absent in France, 
but they now sent urgent messages to him to 
return. He obeyed the summons, and turned 
his face toward Scotland. 

In the mean time, Mary continued in con- 
finement in her little tower. She was not 
treated like a common prisoner, but had, in 
some degree, the attentions due to her rank. 
There were five or six female, and about as 
many male attendants ; though, if the rooms 
which are exhibited to visitors at the present 
day as the apartments which she occupied are 
really such, her quarters were very contracted. 
They consist of small apartments of an octa- 
gonal form, one over the other, with tortuous 
and narrow staircases in the solid wall to as- 
cend from one to the other. The roof and the 
floors of the tower are now gone, but the stair- 
ways, the capacious fireplaces, the loopholes, 
and the one window remain, enabling the vis- 
itor to reconstruct the dwelling in imagination, 
^nd even to fancy Mary herself there again, 




Mary, facep.1S2 

Mary,^ Queen of Scots, in Captivity. 

14-M»ry 



LOCH LEVEN CASTLE. 183 

seated on the stone seat by the window look- 
ing over the water at the distant hills, and sigh- 
ing to be free. 

The Hamilton lords were not strong enough 
to attempt her rescue. The weight of influ- 
ence and power thoughout the country went 
gradually and irresistibly into the other scale. 
There were great debates among the authori- 
ties of government as to what should be done. 
The Hamilton lords made proposals in behalf 
of Mary which the government coulfl not ac- 
cede to. Other proposals were made by dif- 
ferent parties in the councils of the insurgent 
nobles, some more and some less hard for the 
captive queen. The conclusion, however, final- 
ly was, to urge Mary to resign her crown in 
favor of her son, and to appoint Murray, when 
he should return, to act as regent till the 
prince should be of age. 

They accordingly sent commissioners to 
Loch Leven to propose these measures to the 
queen. There were three instruments of ab- 
dication prepared for her to sign. By one she 
resigned the crown in favor of her son. By 
the second she appointed Murray to be regent 
as soon as he should return from France. By 
the third she appointed commissioners to gov- 
ern the country until Murray should return. 
They knew that Mary would be extremely un- 
willing to sign these papers, and yet that they 



184 MAHY QUEEN OF gCOtS. 

must contrive, in some way, to obtain her sig- 
nature without any open violence ; for the sig- 
nature, to be of legal force, must be, in some 
sense, her voluntary act. 

The two commissioners whom they sent to 
her were ^Melville and Lindsay. Melville was 
a thoughtful and a reasonable man, who had 
long been in Mary's service, and who possessed 
a great share of her confidence and good will. 
Lindsay was, on the other hand, of an over- 
bearing* and violent temper, of very rude 
speech and demeanor, and was known to be 
unfriendly to the queen. They hoped that 
Mary would be induced to sign the papers by 
Melville's gentle persuasions ; if not, Lindsay 
was to see what he could do by denunciations 
and threats. 

When the two commissioners arrived at the 
castle, Melville alone went first into the pres- 
ence of the queen. He opened the subject to 
her in a gentle and respectful manner. He 
laid before her the distracted state of Scotland, 
the uncertain and vague suspicions floating in 
the public mind on the subject of Darnley's 
murder, and the irretrievable shade which had 
been thrown over her position by the unhappy 
marriage with Bothwell ; and he urged her to 
consent to the proposed measures, as the only 
way now left to restore peace to the land. 
Mary heard him patiently, but replied that she 



LOCH LEVEN CASTLE. 185 

could not consent to his proposal. By doing 
so she should not only sacrifice her own rights, 
and degrade herself from the position she was 
entitled to occupy, but she should, in some 
sense, acknowledge herself guilty of the 
charges brought against her, and justify her 
enemies. 

Melville, finding that his efforts were vain, 
called Lindsay in. He entered with a fierce 
and determined air. Mary was reminded of the 
terrible night when he and Ruthven broke into 
her little supper-room at Holyrood in quest of 
Rizzio. She was agitated and alarmed. Lind- 
say assailed her with denunciations and threats 
of the most violent character. There ensued 
a scene of the most rough and ferocious passion 
on the one side, and of anguish, terror, and 
despair on the other, which is said to have 
made this day the most wretched of all the 
wretched days of Mary's life. Sometimes she 
sat pale, motionless, and almost stupefied. 
At others, she was overwhelmed with sorrow 
and tears. She finally yielded ; and taking 
the pen, she signed the papers. Lindsay and 
Melville took them, left the castle gate, entered 
their boat, and were rowed away to the shore. 
This was on the 25th of July, 1567, and 
four days afterward the young prince was 
crowned at Stirling. His title was James VL 
Lindsay made oath at the coronation that he 



186 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

was a witness of Mary's abdication of the 
crown in favor of her son, and that it was her 
own free and voluntary act. James was about 
one year old. The coronation took place in 
the chapel where Mary had been crowned in 
her infancy, about twenty-five years before. 
Mary herself, though unconscious of her own 
coronation, mourned bitterly over that of her 
son. Unhappy mother ! how little was she 
aware, when her heart was filled with joy and 
gladness at his birth, that in one short year 
his mere existence would furnish to her 
enemies the means of consummating and seal- 
ing her ruin. 

On returning from the chapel to the state 
apartments of the castle, after the coronation, 
the noblemen by whom the infant had been 
crowned walked in solemn procession, bearing 
the badges and insignia of the newly-invested 
royalty. One carried the crown. Morton, 
who was to exercise the government until 
Murray should return, followed with the 
scepter, and a third bore the infant king, who 
gazed about unconsciously upon the scene, 
regardless alike of his mother's lonely wretch- 
edness and of his own new scepter and crown. 

In the mean time, Murray was drawing 
near toward the confines of Scotland. He was 
somewhat uncertain how to act. Having been 
^bs^nt for some time in France and on thQ 




Jlary,/acep 



Mary Abdicating tlie Throne. 



LOCH LEVEN CASTLE. 187 

Continent, he was not certain how far the peo- 
ple of Scotland were really and cordially in 
favor of the revolution which had been effected, 
Mary's friends might claim that her acts of ab- 
dication, having been obtained while she was 
under duress, were null and void, and if they 
were strong enough they might attempt to 
reinstate her upon the throne. In this case, 
it would be better for him not to have acted 
with the insurgent government at all. To gain 
information on these points, Murray sent to 
IMclville to come and meet him on the border. 
IMelville came. The result of their conferences 
was, that Murray resolved to visit Mary in her 
tower before he adopted any decisive course. 

IMurray accordingly journeyed northward 
to Loch Leven, and, embarking in the boat 
wliich plied between the castle and the shore, 
he crossed the sheet of water, and was admitted 
into \he fortress. He had a long interview 
with Mary alone. At the sight of her long- 
absent brother, who had been her friend and 
guide in her early days of prosperity and hap- 
piness, and who had accompanied her through 
so many changing scenes, and who now re- 
turned, after his long separation from her, to 
find her a lonely and wretched captive, in- 
volved in irretrievable ruin, if not in acknowl- 
edged guilt, she was entirely overcome by 
her emotions. She burst into tears and could 



188 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

not speak. What further passed at this inter- 
view was never precisely known. They parted 
tolerably good friends, however, and yet 
Murray immediately assumed the government, 
by which it is supposed that he succeeded in 
persuading Mary that such a step was now 
best for her sake as well as for that of all others 
concerned. 

Murray, however, did not fail to warn her, 
as he himself states, in a very serious manner, 
against any attempt to change her situation. 
" Madam," said he, "I will plainly declare to 
you what the sources of danger are from which 
I think you have most to apprehend. First, 
any attempt, of whatever kind, that you may 
make to create disturbance in the country, 
through friends that may still adhere to your 
cause, and to interfere with the government of 
your son ; secondly, devising or attempting 
any plan of escape from this island ; thirdly, 
taking any measures for inducing the Queen 
of England or the French king to come to your 
aid ; and, lastly, persisting in your attachment 
to Earl Bothwell." He warned Mary solemnly 
against any and all of these, and then took his 
leave. He was soon after proclaimed regent. 
A Parliament was assembled to sanction all 
these proceedings, and the new government 
was established, apparently upon a firm foun- 
dation. 



LOCH LEVEN CASTLE. 189 

Mary remained, during- the winter, in captiv- 
ity, earnestly desiring, however, notwithstand- 
ing Murray's warning, to find some way of es- 
cape. She knew that there must be many who 
had remained friends to her cause. She thought 
that if she could once make her escape from 
her prison, these friends would rally around 
her, and that she could thus, perhaps, regain 
her throne again. But strictly watched as she 
was, and in a prison which was surrounded by 
the waters of a lake, all hope of escape seemed 
to be taken away. 

Now there were, in the family of the Lord 
Douglas at the castle, two young men, George 
and William Douglas. The oldest, George, 
was about twenty-five years of age, and the 
youngest was seventeen. George was the son 
of Lord and Lady Douglas who kept the cas- 
tle. William was an orphan boy, a relative, 
who, having no home, had been received into 
the family. These young men soon began to 
feel a strong interest in the beautiful captive 
confined in their father's castle, and, before 
many months, this interest became so strong 
tliat they began to feel willing to incur the 
dangers and responsibilities of aiding her in ef- 
fecting her escape. They had secret confer- 
ences with Mary on the subject. They went 
to the shore on various pretexts, and contrived 
to make their plans known to Mary's friends. 



190 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

that they might be ready to receive her in case 
they should succeed. 

The plan at length was ripe for execution. 
It was arranged thus. The castle not being 
large, there was not space within its walls for 
all the accommodations required for its in- 
mates ; much was done on the shore, where 
there was quite a little village of attendants 
and dependents pertaining to the castle. This 
little village has since grown into a flourishing 
manufacturing town, where a great variety of 
plaids, and tartans, and other Scotch fabrics 
are made. Its name is Kinross. Communica- 
tion with this part of the shore was then, as 
now, kept up by boats, which generally then 
belonged to the castle, though now to the town. 

On the day when Mary was to attempt her 
escape, a servant woman was brought by one 
of the castle boats from the shore with a bun- 
dle of clothes for Mary. Mary, whose health 
and strength had been impaired by her confine- 
ment and sufferings, was often in her bed. She 
was so at this time, though perhaps she was 
feigning now more feebleness than she really 
felt. The servant woman came into her apart- 
ment and undressed herself, while Mary rose, 
took the dress which she laid aside, and put it 
on as a disguise. The woman took Mary's 
place in bed. Mary covered her face with a 
muffler, and, taking another bundle in her 



LOCH LEVEN CASTLE. 191 

hand to assist in her disguise, she passed across 
the court, issued from the castle gate, went to 
the landing stairs, and stepped into the boat for 
the men to row her to the shore. 

The oarsmen, who belonged to the castle, 
supposing that all was right, pushed off, and 
began to row toward the land. As they were 
crossing the water, however, they observed 
that their passenger was very particular to keep 
her face covered, and attempted to pull away 
the muffler, saying, "Let us see what kind of 
a looking damsel this is." Mary, in alarm, 
put up her hands to her face to hold the muffler 
there. The smooth, white, and delicate fin- 
gers revealed to the m.en at once that they 
were carrying away a lady in disguise. Mary, 
finding that concealment was no longer pos- 
sible, dropped her muffler, looked upon the 
men with composure and dignity, told them 
that she was their queen, that they were bound 
by their allegiance to her to obey her com- 
mands, and she commanded them to go on 
and row her to the shore. 

The men decided, however, that their alle- 
giance was due to the lord of the castle rather 
than to the helpless captive trying to escape 
from it. They told her that they must return. 
Mary was not only disappointed at the failure 
of licr plans, but she was now anxious lest her 
friends, the young Douglases, should be im- 



192 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

plicated in the attempt, and should suffer in 
consequence of it. The men, however, sol- 
emnly promised her, that if she should quietly 
return, they would not make the circumstances 
known. The secret, however, was too great 
a secret to be kept. In a few days it all came 
to light. Lord and Lady Douglas were very 
angry with their son, and banished him, to- 
gether with two of IMary's servants, from the 
castle. Whatever share young William Doug- 
las had in the scheme was not found out, and 
he was suffered to remain. George Douglas 
went only to Kinross. He remained there 
watching for another opportunity to help Mary 
to her freedom. 

In the mean time, the watch and ward held 
over Mary was more strict and rigorous than 
ever, her keepers being resolved to double 
their vigilance, while George and William, on 
the other hand, resolved to redouble their ex- 
ertions to find some means to circumvent "it. 
William, who was only a boy of seventeen, 
and who remained within the castle, acted his 
part in a very sagacious and admirable man- 
ner. He was silent, and assumed a thought- 
less and unconcerned manner in his general 
deportment, which put every one off their 
guard in respect to him. George, who was at 
Kinross, held frequent communications with 
the Hamilton lords, encouraging them to hope 



LOCH LEVEN CASTLE. 193 

for Mary's escape, and leading them to con- 
tinue in combination, and to be ready to act 
at a moment's warning. They communicated 
with each other, too, by secret means, across 
the lake, and with Mary in her solitary tower. 
It is said that George, wishing to make Mary 
understand that their plans for rescuing her 
were not abandoned, and not having the op- 
portunity to do so directly, sent her a picture 
of the mouse liberating the lion from his snares, 
hoping that she would dravs^ from the picture 
the inference which he intended. 

At length the time arrived for another at- 
tempt. It was about the first of May. By 
looking at the engraving of Loch Leven Castle, 
it will be seen that Ihfere was a window in 
Mary's tower looking out over the water. 
George Douglas's plan was to bring a boat up 
to this window in the night, and take Mary 
down the wall into it. The place of egress by 
which Mary escaped is called in some of the ac- 
counts a postern gate, and yet tradition at the 
castle says that it was through this window. It 
is not improbable that this window might have 
been intended to be used sometimes as a pos- 
tern gate, and that the iron grating with which 
it was guarded was made to open and shut, 
the key being kept with the other keys of the 
castle. 

The time for the attempt was fixed upon for 



194 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

Sunday night, on the 2d of May. George 
Douglas was ready with the boat early in the 
evening. When it was dark, he rowed cautious- 
ly across the water, and took his position under 
Mary's window. William Douglas was in the 
mean time at supper in the great square tower 
w^ith his father and mother. The keys were 
lying upon the table. He contrived to get 
them into his possession, and then cautiously 
stole away. He locked the tower as he came 
out, went across the court to Mary's room, lib- 
erated her through the postern window, and 
descended with her into the boat. One of her 
maids, whose name was Jane Kennedy, was 
to have accompanied her, but, in their eager- 
ness to make sure of Mary, they forgot or ne- 
glected her, and she had to leap down after 
them, which feat she accomplished without 
any serious injury. The boat pushed off im- 
mediately, and the Douglases began to pull 
hard for the shore. They threw the keys of 
the castle into the lake, as if the impossibility 
of recovering them, in that case, made the im- 
prisonment of the family more secure. The 
whole party were, of course, in the highest 
state of excitement and agitation. Jane Ken- 
nedy helped to row, and it is said that even 
Mary applied her strength to one of the oars. 
They landed safely on the south side of the 
loch, far from Kinross. Several of the Hamil- 



LOCH LEVEN CASTLE. 195 

ton lords were ready there to receive the fugi- 
tive. They mounted her on horseback, and 
galloped away. There was a strong party to 
escort her. They rode hard all night, and the 
next morning they arrived safely at Hamilton. 
"Now," said Mary, *'I am once more a 
queen." 

It was true. She was again a queen. Pop- 
ular feeling ebbs and flows with prodigious 
force, and the change from one state to the 
other depends, sometimes, on very accidental 
causes. The news of Mary's escape spread 
rapidly over the land. Her friends were en- 
couraged and emboldened. Sympathies, long 
dormant and inert, were awakened in her 
favor. She issued a proclamation, declaring 
that her abdication had been forced upon her, 
and, as such, was null and void. She sum- 
moned Murray to surrender his powers as re- 
gent, and to come and receive orders from 
her. ' She called upon all her faithful subjects, 
to take up arms and gather around her stand- 
ard. Murray refused to obey, but large masses 
of the people gave in their adhesion to their 
liberated queen, and flocked to Hamilton to 
enter into her service. In a week Mary found 
herself at the head of an army of six thousand 
men. 

The Castle of Loch Leven is now a solitary 

15-MKy 



196 MARY QUEEK OF SCOTS. 

ruin. The waters of the loch have been low- 
ered by means of an excavation of the outlet, 
and a portion of land has been left bare around 
the walls, which the proprietor has planted 
%vith trees. Visitors are taken from Kinross 
in a boat to view the scene. The square 
tower, though roofless and desolate, still 
stands. The window in the second story, 
which served as the entrance, and the one 
above, where the chain was worked, with the 
deep furrows in the sill cut by its friction, are 
shown by the guide. The courtyard is over- 
grown with w^eeds, and encumbered with 
fallen stones and old foundations. The chapel 
is gone, though its outline may be still traced 
in the ruins of its walls. The octagonal tower 
which Mary occupied remains, and the visitors, 
climbing up by the narrow stone stairs in the 
wall, look out at the window over the waters 
of the loch and the distant hills, and try to re- 
create in imagination the scene which the 
apartment presented when the unhappy captive 
was there. 




CHAPTER XI. 



THE LONG CAPTIVITY. 

Hamilton, which had been thus far the 
queen's place of rendezvous, was a palace 
rather than a castle, and therefore not a place 
of defense. It was situated, as has been al- 
ready stated, on the River Clyde, above Glas- 
gow • that is, toward the southeast of it, the 
River Clyde flowing toward the northwest. 
The Castle of Dumbarton, which has already 
been mentioned as the place from which Mary 
embarked for France in her early childhood 
was below Glasgow, on the northern shore of 
the river. It stands there still in good repair, 
and is well garrisoned; it crowns a rock 
which rises abruptly from the midst of a com- 
paratively level country, smiling with villages 
and cultivated fields, and frowns sternly upon 
the peaceful steamers and merchant ships 
which are continually gliding along under its 
P-uns, up and down the Clyde. 

Queen Mary concluded to move forward to 
Dumbarton, it being a place of greater safety 
than Hamilton. Murray gathered his forces 



198 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

to intercept her march. The two armies met 
near Glasgow, as the queen was moving west- 
ward, down the river. There was a piece of 
rising ground between them, which each party 
was eager to ascend before the other should 
reach it. The leader of the forces on Murray's 
side ordered every horseman to take up a foot- 
soldier behind him, and ride with all speed to 
the top of the hill. By this means the great 
body of Murray's troops were put in possession 
of the vantage ground. The queen's forces 
took post on another rising ground, less favor- 
able, at a little distance. The place was called 
Langside. A cannonading was soon com- 
menced, and a general battle ensued. Mary 
watched the progress of it with intense emo- 
tions. Her forces began soon to give way, 
and before many hours they were retreating 
in all directions, the whole country being soon 
covered with the awful spectacles which are 
afforded by one terrified and panic-stricken 
army flying before the furious and triumphant 
rage of another. Mary gazed on the scene in 
an agony of grief and despair. 

A few faithful friends kept near her side, and 
told her that she must hurry away. They 
turned to the southward, and rode away from 
the ground. They pressed on as rapidly as 
possible toward the southern coast, thinking 
that the only safety for Mary now was for her 



THE LONG CAPTIVITY. 199 

to make her escape from the country alto- 
gether, and go either to England or to France, 
in hopes of obtaining foreign aid to enable her 
to recover her throne. They at length reached 
the sea-coast. Mary was received into an 
abbey called Dundrennan, not far from the 
English frontier. Here she remained, with a 
few nobles and a small body of attendants, 
for two days, spending the time in anxious con- 
sultations to determine what should be done. 
Mary herself was in favor of going to England, 
and appealing to Elizabeth for protection and 
help. Her friends and advisers, knowing 
Elizabeth perhaps better than Mary did, rec- 
ommended that she should sail for France, in 
hopes of awakening sympathy there. But 
Mary, as we might naturally have expected, con- 
sidering the circumstances under which she left 
that country, found herself extremely unwill- 
ing to go there as a fugitive and a suppliant. 
It was decided, finally, to go to England. 

The nearest stronghold in England was Car- 
lisle Castle, which was not very far from the 
frontier. The boundary between the two 
kingdoms is formed here by the Solway Frith, 
a broad arm of the sea. Dundrennan Abbey, 
to which Mary had retreated, was near the 
town of Kirkcudbright, which is, of course, on 
the northern side of the Frith ; it is also near 
the sea. Carlisle is further up the Frith, near 



200 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

where the River Solway empties into it, and is 
twenty or thirty miles from the shore. 

Mary sent a messenger to the governor of 
the castle at Carlisle to inquire whether he 
would receive and protect her. She could not, 
however, wait for an answerto this message, as 
the country was all in commotion, and she was 
exposed to an attack at any time from Mur- 
ray's forces, in which case, even if they should 
not succeed in taking her captive, they might 
effectually cut off her retreat from Scottish 
ground. She accordingly determined to pro- 
ceed immediately, and receive the answer 
from the governor of the castle on the way. 
She set out on the i6th of May. Eighteen or 
twenty persons constituted her train. This 
was all that remained to her of her army of six 
thousand men. She proceeded to the shore. 
They provided a fishing-boat for the voyage, 
furnishing it as comfortably for her as circum- 
stances would admit. She embarked, and 
sailed along the coast, eastward, up the Frith, 
for about eighteen miles, gazing mournfully 
upon the receding shore of her native land — 
receding, in fact, now from her view forever. 
They landed at the most convenient port for 
reaching Carlisle, intending to take the re- 
mainder of the journey by land. 

In the mean time, the messenger, on his ar- 
rival at Carlisle, found that the governor had 



THE LONG CAPTIVITY. 201 

gone to London. His second in rank, whom 
he had left in command, immediately sent off 
an express after him to inform him of the event. 
The name of this lieutenant-governor was 
Lowther. Lowther did all in Mary's favor 
that it was in his power to do. He directed 
the messenger to inform her that he had sent 
to London for instructions from Elizabeth, but 
that, in the mean time, she would be a welcome 
guest in his castle, and that he would defend 
her there from all her enemies. He then sent 
around to all the nobles and men of distinction 
in the neighborhood, informing them of the ar- 
rival of the distinguished visitor, and having 
assembled them, they proceeded together to- 
ward the coast to meet -and receive the un- 
happy fugitive with the honors becoming her 
rank, though such honors must have seemed 
little else than a mockery in her present 
condition. 

Mary was received at the castle as an hon- 
ored guest. It is, however, a curious circum- 
stance, that, in respect to the reception of 
princes and queens in royal castles, there is 
little or no distinction between the ceremonies 
which mark the honored guest and those which 
attend the helpless captive. Mary had a great 
many friends at first, who came out of Scot- 
land to visit her. The authorities ordered re- 
pairs to be commenced upon the castle, to fit 



202 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

it more suitably for so distinguished an inmate, 
and, in consequence of the making of these 
repairs, they found it inconvenient to admit 
visitors. Of course, Mary, being a mere guest, 
could not complain. She wanted to take a 
walk beyond the limits of the ciistle, upon a 
green to which there was access through a 
postern gate. Certainly : the governor made 
no objection to such a walk, but sent twenty 
or thirty armed men to accompany her. They 
might be considered either as an honorary es- 
cort, or as a guard to watch her movements, 
to prevent her escape, and to secure her 
return. At one time she proposed to go a 
hunting. They allowed her to go, properly 
atlended. On her return, however, the officer 
reported to his superior that she was so admi- 
rable in her horsemanship, and could ride with 
so much fearlessness and speed, that he 
thought it might be possible for a body of her 
friends to come and carry her off, on some 
such occasion, back across the frontier. So 
they determined to tell Mary, when she wished 
to hunt again, that they thought it not safe for 
her to go out on such excursions, as her enemies 
might make a sudden invasion and carry her 
away. The precautions would be just the 
same to protect Mary from her enemies as to 
keep her from her friends. 
Elizabeth sent her captive cousin very kind 



THE LONG CAPTlV^lTY. '203 

and condoling messages, despatching, how- 
ever, by the same messenger stringent orders 
to the commander of the castle to be sure and 
keep her safely. Mary asked for an inter- 
view with Elizabeth. Elizabeth's officers re- 
plied that she could not properly admit Mary 
to a personal interview until she had been, in 
some way or other, cleared of the suspicion 
which attached to her in respect to the murder 
of Darnley. They proposed, moreover, that 
Mary should consent to have that question ex- 
amined before some sort of court which Eliza- 
beth might constitute for this purpose. Now 
it is a special point of honor among all sover- 
eign kings and queens, throughout the civilized 
world, that they can, technically, do no wrong ; 
that they cannot in any way be brought to 
trial ; and especially that they cannot be, by 
any means or in any way, amenable to each 
other. Mary refused to acknowledge any 
English jurisdiction whatever in respect to any 
charges brought against her, a sovereign queen 
of Scotland. 

Elizabeth removed her prisoner to another 
castle further from the frontier than Carlisle, in 
order to place her in a situation where she 
would be more safe /r<9;72 her e7iemies. It was 
not convenient to lodge so many of her attend- 
ants at these new quarters as in the other for- 
tress, and several were dismissed, Additional 



204 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

Obstructions were thrown in the way of her 
seeing- friends and visitors from Scotland. 
Mary found her situation growing every day 
more and more helpless and desolate. Eliza- 
beth urged continually upon her the necessity 
of having the points at issue between herself 
and Murray examined by a commissioner, 
artfully putting it on the ground, not of atrial of 
Mary, but a calling of Murray to account, by 
Mary, for his usurpation. At last, harassed 
and worn down, and finding no ray of hope 
coming to her from any quarter, she consented. 
Elizabeth constituted such a court, which was 
to meet at York, a large and ancient city in 
the north of England. Murray was to appear 
there in person, with other lords, associated 
with him. Mary appointed commissioners to 
appear for her ; and the two parties went into 
court, each thinking that it was the other which 
was accused and on trial. 

The court assembled, and after being opened 
with great parade and ceremony, commenced 
the investigation of the questions at issue, 
which led, of course, to endless criminations 
and recriminations, the ground covering the 
whole history of Mary's career in Scotland. 
They went on for some weeks in this hopeless 
labyrinth, until, at length, Murray produced 
the famous letters alleged to have been written 
by Mary to Both well before Darnley's murder. 



THE LONG CAPTIVITY. 205 

as a part of the evidence, and charged Mary, 
on the strength of this evidence, with having 
been an abettor in the murder. Elizabeth, 
finding that the affair was becoming, as in fact 
she wished it to become, more and more in- 
volved, and wishing to get Mary more and 
more entangled in it, and to draw her still fur- 
ther into her power, ordered the conference, as 
the court was called, to be adjourned to Lon- 
don. Here things took such a turn that Mary 
complained that she was herself treated in so 
unjust a manner, and Murray and his cause 
were allowed so many unfair advantages, that 
she could not allow the discussion on her part 
to continue. The conference was accordingly 
broken up, each party charging the other with 
being the cause of the interruption. 

Murray returned to Scotland to resume his 
government there. Mary was iheld a closer 
captive than ever. She sent to Elizabeth ask- 
ing her to remove these restraints, and allow 
her to depart either to her own country or to 
France. Elizabeth replied that she could not, 
considering all the circumstances of the case, 
allow her to leave England ; but that, if she 
would give up all claims to the government of 
Scotland to her son, the young prince, she 
might remain in peace in England. Mary re- 
plied that she would suffer death a thousand 
times rather than dishonor herself in the eye§ 



206 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

of the world by abandoning, in such a way, her 
rights as a sovereign. The last words which 
she should speak, she said, should be those of 
the Queen of Scotland. 

Elizabeth therefore considered that she had 
no alternative left but to keep Mary a pris- 
oner. She accordingly retained her for some 
time in confinement, but she soon found that 
such a charge was a serious incumbrance to 
her, and one not unattended with danger. The 
disaffected in her own realm were beginning 
to form plots, and to consider whether they 
could not, in some way or other, make use of 
Mary's claims to the English crown to aid them. 
Finally, Elizabeth came to the conclusion, 
when she had become a little satiated with the 
feeling, at first so delightful, of having Mary 
in her power, that, after all, it would be quite 
as convenient to have her imprisoned in Scot- 
land, and she opened a negotiation with Murray 
for delivering Mary into his hands. He was, 
on his part, to agree to save her life, and to 
keep her a close prisoner, and he was to deliver 
hostages to Elizabeth as security for the ful- 
filment of these obligations. 

Various difficulties, however, occurred in the 
way of the accomplishment of these plans, and 
before the arrangement was finally completed, 
it was. cut suddenly short by Murray's miser- 
able end. One of the Hamiltons, who had 




Mary Protesting against her Captivity. 



THE LONG CAPTIVITY. 207 

been with Mary at Langside, was taken pris- 
oner after the battle. Murray, who, of course, 
as the legally constituted regent in the name 
of James, considered himself as representing 
the royal authority of the kingdom, regarded 
these prisoners as rebels taken in the act of 
insurrection against their sovereign. They 
were condemned to death, but finally were 
pardoned at the place of execution. Their 
estates were, however, confiscated, and given 
to the followers and favorites of Murray. 

One of these men, in taking possession of the 
house of Hamilton, with a cruel brutality char- 
acteristic of the times, turned Hamilton's fam- 
ily out abruptly in a cold night— perhaps exas- 
perated by resistance which he may have en- 
countered. The wife of Hamilton, it is said, 
was sent out naked ; but the expression means, 
probably, very insufficiently clothed for such 
an exposure. At any rate, the unhappy out- 
cast wandered about, half frantic with anger 
and terror, until, before morning, she was 
wholly frantic and insane. To have such a 
calamity brought upon him in consequence 
merely of his fidelity to his queen, was, as the 
bereaved and wretched husband thought, an 
injury not to be borne. He considered Murray 
the responsible author of these miseries, and 
silently and calmly resolved on a terrible re- 
venge. 



208 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

Murray was making a progress through the 
country, traveling in state with a great ret- 
inue, and was to pass through LinHthgow. 
There is a town of that name close by the pal- 
ace. Hamilton provided himself with a room 
in one of the houses on the principal .^treet, 
through which he knew that Murray must pass. 
He had a fleet horse ready for him at the back 
door. The front door was barricaded. There 
was a sort of balcony or gallery projecting 
toward the street, with a window in it. He 
stationed himself here, having carefully taken 
every precaution to prevent his being seen 
from the street, or overheard in his move- 
ments. Murray lodged in the town during the 
night, and Hamilton posted himself in his am- 
buscade the next morning, armed with a gun. 

The town was thronged, and Murray, on is- 
SLung from his lodging, escorted by his caval- 
cade, found the streets crowded with specta- 
tors. He made his way slowly, on account "of 
the throng. 'When he arrived at the proper 
point, Hamilton took his aim in a cool and de- 
liberate manner, screened from observation by 
black cloths with which he had darkened his 
hiding-place. He fired. The ball passed 
through the body of the regent, and thence, 
descending as it went, killed a horse on the 
other side of him^ Murray fell. There was a 
universal outcry of surprise and fear. They 




Mary, face p. 208 

Assassination of the Earl of Murray. 

16-Mary 



^HE LONG CAPTIVITY. 209 

made an onset upon the house from which the 
shot had been fired. The door was strongly 
barricaded. Before they could get the means 
to force an entrance, Hamilton was on his 
horse and far away. The regent was carried 
to his lodgings, and died that night. 

Murray was Queen Mary's half brother, and 
the connection of his fortunes with hers, con- 
sidered in respect to its intimacy and the length 
of its duration, was, on the whole, greater 
than that of any other individual. He may 
be said to have governed Scotland, in reality, 
during the whole of Mary's nominal reign, 
first as her minister and friend, and afterward 
as her competitor and foe. He was, at any 
rate, during most of her life, her nearest rela- 
tive and her most constant companion, and 
Mary mourned his death with many tears. 

There was a great nobleman in England, 
named the Duke of Norfolk, who had vast es- 
tates, and was regarded as the greatest subject 
in the realm. He was a Catholic. Among 
the other countless schemes and plots to which 
Mary's presence in England gave rise, he 
formed a plan of marrying her, and, through 
her claim to the crown and by the help of the 
Catholics, to overturn the government of 
Elizabeth. He entered into negotiations with 
Mary, and she consented to become his wife, 
without, however, she says, being a party to 



210 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

his political schemes. His plots were dis- 
covered ; he was imprisoned, tried, and be- 
headed. Mary was accused of sharing the 
guilt of his treason. She denied this. She 
was not very vigorously proceeded against, 
but she suffered in the event of the affair an- 
other sad disappointment of her hopes of 
liberty, and her confinement became more 
strict -and absolute than ever. 

Still she had quite a numerous retinue of 
attendants. Many of her former friends were 
allowed to continue with her. Jane Kennedy, 
who had escaped with her from Loch Leven, 
remained in her service. She was removed 
from castle to castle, at Elizabeth's orders, to 
diminish the probability of the forming and 
maturing of plans of escape. She amused her 
self sometimes in embroidery and similar pur- 
suits, and sometimes she pined and languished 
under the pressure of her sorrows and woes. 
Sixteen or eighteen years parsed away in this 
manner. She was almost forgotten. Very 
exciting public events were taking place in 
England and in Scotland, and the name of the 
poor captive queen at length seemed to pass 
from men's minds, except so far as it was whis- 
pered secretly in plots and intrigues. 




CHAPTER XII. 



THE END. 



Mary did not always discourage the plots 
and intrigues with which her name was con- 
nected. She, of course, longed for deliver- 
ance from the thraldom in which Elizabeth held 
her, and was ready to embrace any opportu- 
nity which promised retease. She thus seems 
to have listened from time to time to the over- 
tures which were made to her, and involved 
herself, in Elizabeth's opinion, more or less, 
in the responsibility which attached to them. 
Elizabeth did not, however, in such cases, do 
anything more than to increase somewhat the 
rigors of her imprisonment. She was afraid 
to proceed to extremities with her, partly, per- 
haps, for fear that she might, by doing so, 
awaken the hostility of France, whose king 
was Mary's cousin, or of Scotland, whose 
monarch was her son. 

At length, however, in the year 1586, about 

eighteen years from the commencement of 

Mary's captivity, a plot was formed in which 

211 



212 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

she became so seriously involved as to subject 
herself to the charge of aiding and abetting in 
the high treason of which the leaders of the 
plot were proved to be guilty. This plot is 
known in history by the name of Babington's 
conspiracy. Babington was a young gentle- 
man of fortune, who lived in the heart of 
England. He was inspired with a strong 
degree of interest in Mary's fate, and wished 
to rescue her from her captivity. He joined 
himself with a large party of influential indi- 
viduals of the Catholic faith. The conspirators 
opened negotiations with the courts of France 
and Spain for aid. They planned an insurrec- 
tion, the assassination of Elizabeth, the rescue 
of Mary, and a general revolution. They 
maintained a correspondence with Mary. This 
correspondence was managed very secretly, 
the letters being placed by a confidential mes- 
senger in a certain hole in the castle wall where 
Queen Mary was confined. 

One day, when Mary was going out to ride, 
just as she was entering her carriage, ofiicers 
suddenly arrived from London. They told her 
that the plot in which she had been engaged 
had been discovered ; that fourteen of the prin- 
cipal conspirators had been hung, seven on 
each of two successive days, and that they had 
come to arrest some of her attendants and to 
seize her papers. They accordingly went into 



THE END. 218 

her apartments, opened all her desks, trunks, 
and cabinets, seized her papers, and took them 
to London. Mary sat down in the scene of 
desolation and disorder which they left, and 
wept bitterly. 

The papers which were seized were taken to 
London, and Elizabeth's government began 
seriously to agitate the question of bringing 
Mary herself to trial. One would have thought 
that, in her forlorn and desolate condition, she 
would have looked to her son for sympathy 
and aid. But rival claimants to a crown can 
have little kind feeling to each other, even if 
they are mother and son. James, as he gradu- 
ally approached towards maturity, took sides 
against his mother. In fact, all Scotland was 
divided, and was for many years in a state of 
civil war : those who advocated Mary's right 
to the crown on one side, and James's adher- 
ents on the other. They were called king's 
men and queen's men. James was, of course, 
brought up in hostility to his mother, and he 
wrote to her, about a year before Babington's 
conspiracy, in terms so hostile and so devoid 
of filial love, that his ingratitude stung her to 
the heart. "Was it for this, " she said, ''that 
I made so many sacrifices, and endured so 
many trials on his account in his early years ? 
I have made it the whole business of my life 
to protect and secure his rights, and to open 



214 MARY QUEEN OP SCOTS. 

before him a prospect of future power and 
glory : and this is the return." 

The Enghsh government, under Elizabeth's 
direction, concluded to bring Mary to a pub- 
lic trial. They removed her, accordingly, to 
the Castle of Fotheringay. Fotheringay is in 
Northamptonshire, which is in the very heart 
of England, Northampton, the shire town, 
being about sixty miles northwest of London. 
Fotheringay Castle was on the banks of the 
River Nen, or Avon, which flows northeast 
from Northampton to the sea. A few miles be- 
low the castle is the ancient town of Peter- 
borough, where there was a monastery and a 
great cathedral church. The monastery had 
been built a thousand years before. 

They removed Mary to Fotheringay Castle 
for her trial, and lawyers, counselors, com- 
missioners, and officers of state began to as- 
semble there from all quarters. The castle 
was a spacious structure. It was surrounded 
with two moats, and with double walls, and 
was strongly fortified. It contained numer- 
ous and spacious apartments, and it had es- 
pecially one large hall which was well adapted 
to the purposes of this great trial. The prep- 
arations for the solemn ordeal through which 
Mary was now to pass, brought her forth from 
the obscurity in which she had so long been 
lost to the eyes of mankind, and made her the 



THE END. 215 

universal object of interest and attention in 
England, Scotland, and France. The people 
of all these nations looked on with great inter- 
est at the spectacle of one queen tried solemnly 
on a charge of high treason against another. 
The stories of her beauty, her graces, her mis- 
fortunes, which had slumbered for eighteen 
years, were all now revived, and everybody 
felt a warm interest in the poor captive, worn 
down by long confinement, and trembling in 
the hands of what they feared would be a mer- 
ciless and terrible power. 

Mary was removed to the Castle of Fother- 
ingay toward the end of September, 1586. 
The preparations for the trial proceeded slowly. 
Everything in which kings and queens, or 
affairs of state were concerned in those days, 
was conducted with great pomp and ceremony. 
The arrangements of the hall were minutely 
prescribed. At the head of it a sort of throne 
was placed, with a royal canopy over it, for 
the Queen of England. This, though it was 
vacant, impressed the court and the specta- 
tors as a symbol of royalty, and denoted that 
the sovereignty of Elizabeth was the power 
before which Mary was arraigned. 

When the preparations were made, Mary re- 
fused to acknowledge the jurisdiction of the 
court. She denied that they had any right to 
arraign or to try her. " I am no subject of 



216 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

Elizabeth's," said she. "I am an independent 
and sovereign queen as well as she, and I will 
not consent to anything inconsistent with 
this my true position. I owe no allegiance to 
England, and I am not, in any sense, subject 
to her laws. I came into the realm only to 
ask assistance from a sister queen, and I have 
been made a captive, and detained many 
years in an unjust and cruel imprisonment; 
and though now worn down both in body and 
mind by my protracted sufferings, I am not 
yet so enfeebled as to forget what is due to 
myself, my ancestors, and my country." 

This refusal of Mary's to plead, or to ac- 
knowledge the jurisdiction of the court, caused 
a new delay. They urged her to abandon her 
resolution. They told her that if she refused 
to plead, the trial would proceed without her 
action, and, by pursuing such a course, she 
would only deprive herself of the means of de- 
fense, without at all impeding the course of 
her fate. At length Mary yielded. It would, 
have been better for her to have adhered to 
her first intention. 

The commission by which Mary was to be 
tried consisted of earls, barons, and other per- 
sons of rank, twenty or thirty in number. 
They were seated on each side of the room, 
the throne being at the head. In the center 
Wa§ a table, where the lawyers, by whom the 




Mary, /act p. 2i6 



Trial of Mary, Queen of Scots. 



THE END. 217 

trial was to be conducted, were seated. Below 
this table was a chair for Mary. Behind Mary's 
chair was a rail, dividing off the lower end of 
the hall from the court ; and this formed an 
outer space, to which some spectators were 
admitted. 

Mary took her place in the seat assigned her, 
and the trial proceeded. They adduced the 
evidence against her, and then asked for her 
defense. She said substantially that she had 
a right to make an effort to recover her liberty ; 
that, after being confined a captive so long, 
and having lost forever her youth, her health, 
and her happiness, it was not wonderful that 
she wished to be free ; but that, in endeavor- 
ing to obtain her freedom, she had formed no 
plans to injure Elizabeth, or to interfere in any 
way with her rights or prerogatives as queen. 
The commissioners, after devoting some days 
to hearing evidence, and listening to the de- 
fense, sent Mary back to her apartments, and 
went to London. There they had a final con- 
sultation, and unanimously agreed in the fol- 
lowing decision: "That Mary, commonly 
called Queen of Scots and dowager of France, 
had been an accessory to Babington's con- 
spiracy, and had compassed the death of 
Elizabeth queen of England." 

Elizabeth pretended to be very much con- 
cerned at this result. She laid the proceedings 



218 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

before Parliament. It was supposed then, and 
has always been supposed since, that she wished 
Mary to be beheaded, but desired not to take 
the responsibility of it herself ; and that she 
wanted to appear unwilling, and to be im- 
pelled, greatly against her own inclinations, 
by the urgency of others, to carry the sentence 
into execution. At any rate, Parliament, and 
all the members of the government, approved 
and confirmed the verdict, and wished to have 
it carried into effect. 

It has always been the custom, in modern 
times, to require the solemn act of the supreme 
magistrate of any state to confirm a decision 
of a tribunal which condemns a person to 
death, by signing what is called a warrant for 
the execution. This is done by the king or 
queen in England, and by the governor in one 
of the United States. This warrant is an order, 
very formally written, and sealed with the great 
seal, authorizing the executioner to proceed, 
and carry the sentence into effect. Of course, 
Queen Mary could not be executed unless 
Elizabeth should first sign the warrant. Eliza- 
beth would herself, probably, have been better 
pleased to have been excused from all direct 
agency in the affair. But this could not be. 
She, however, made much delay, and affected 
great unwillingness to proceed. She sent 
messengers to Mary, telling her what the 



THE END. 219 

sentence had been, how sorry she was to hear 
it, and how much she desired to save her life, 
if it were possible. At the same time, she 
told her that she feared it might not be in her 
power, and she advised Mary to prepare her 
mind for the execution of the sentence. 

Mary wrote a letter to Elizabeth in reply. 
She said in this letter that she was glad to hear 
that they had pronounced sentence of death 
against her, for she was weary of life, and had 
no hope of relief or rest from her miseries but 
in the grave. She wrote, therefore, not to ask 
any change in the decision, but to make three 
requests. First that, after her execution, her 
body might be removed to France, and be de- 
posited at Rheims, where the ashes of her 
mother were reposing. Secondly, that her ex- 
ecution should not be in secret, but that her 
personal friends might be present, to attest to 
the world that she met her fate with resig- 
nation and fortitude ; and, thirdly, that her at- 
tendants and friends, who had, through their 
faithful love for her, shared her captivity so 
long, might be permitted to retire wherever 
they pleased, after her death, without any 
molestation. "I hope," said she, in conclu- 
sion, " you will not refuse me these my dying 
requests, but that you will assure me by a 
letter under your own hand that you will 
comply with them, and then I shall die as I 



220 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

have lived, your affectionate sister and pris- 
oner, Mary Queen of Scots." 

Tlie King of France, and James, Mary's son 
in Scotland, made somewhat vigorous efforts 
to arrest the execution of the sentence vi^hich 
had been pronounced against Mary. From 
these and other causes, the signing of the 
warrant was delayed for some months, but at 
length Elizabeth yielded to the solicitations of 
her ministers. She affixed her signature to 
the instrument. The chancellor put upon it 
the great seal, and the commissioners who 
were appointed by it to superintend the exe- 
cution went to Fotheringay. They arrived 
there on the 7th of February, 1587. 

After resting, and refreshing themselves for 
a short time from their journey, the commis- 
sioners sent word to Mary that they wished 
for an interview with her. Mary had retired. 
They said that their business was very impor- 
tant. She rose, and prepared to receive them. 
She assembled all her attendants, fourteen or 
fifteen in number, in order to receive the com- 
missioners in a manner comporting, so far as 
circumstances allowed, with her rank and 
station. The commissioners were at length 
ushered into .the apartment. They stood 
respectfully before her, with their heads un- 
covered. The foremost then, in language as 
forbearing and gentle as was consistent with 




17— Mary 



THE END. 221 

the nature of his message, informed her that 
it had been decided to carry the sentence 
which had been pronounced against her into 
effect, and then he requested another of the 
number to read the warrant for her exe- 
cution. 

Mary listened to it calmly and patiently. 
Her attendants, one after another, were over- 
come by the mournful and awful solemnity of 
the scene, and melted into tears. Mary, how- 
ever, was calm. When the reading of the 
warrant was ended, she said that she was 
sorry that her cousin Elizabeth should set the 
example of taking the life of a sovereign queen ; 
but for herself, she was willing to die. Life 
had long ceased to afford her any peace or 
happiness, and she was ready to exchange it 
for the prospect of immortality. She then laid 
her hand upon the New Testament, which 
was near her, of course a Catholic version, 
and called God to witness that she had never 
plotted herself, or joined in plots with others, 
for the death of Elizabeth. One of the com- 
missioners remarked that her oath being upon 
a Catholic version of the Bible, they should 
not consider it valid. She rejoined that it 
ought to be considered the more sacred and 
solemn on that account, as that was the ver- 
sion which she regarded as the only one which 
was authoritative and true. 



222 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

Mary then asked the commissioners several 
questions, as whether her son James had not 
expressed any interest in her fate, and whether 
no foreign princes had interposed to save her. 
The commissioners answered these and other 
inquiries, and Mary learned fi;om their answers 
that her fate was sealed. She then asked 
them what time was appointed for the exe- 
cution. They replied that it was to take place 
at eight o'clock the following morning. 

Mary had not expected so early an hour to 
be named. She said it was sudden ; and she 
seemed agitated and distressed. She, how- 
ever, soon recovered her composure, and 
asked to have a Catholic priest allowed to visit 
her. The commissioners replied that that 
could. not be permitted. They, however, pro- 
posed to send the Dean of Peterborough to 
visit her. A dean is the ecclesiastical func- 
tionary presiding over a cathedral church ; and, 
of course, the Dean of Peterborough . was 
the clergyman of the highest rank in that vic- 
inity. He was, however, a Protestant, and 
Mary did not wish to see him. 

The commissioners withdrew, and left Mary 
with her friends, when there ensued one of 
those scenes of anguish and suffering which 
those who witness them never forget, but carry 
the gloomy remembrance of them, like a dark 
shadow in the soul, to the end of their days. 



THE END. 



223 



Mary was quiet, and appeared calm. It may, 
however, have been the calm of hopeless and 
absolute despair. Her attendants were over- 
wheln-ied with agitation and grief, the expres- 
sion of which they could not even attempt to 
control. At last they became more composed, 
and Mary asked them to kneel with her in 
prayer ; and she prayed for some time fervent- 
ly and earnestly in the midst of them. 

She then directed supper to be prepared as 
usual, and, until it was ready, she spent her 
time in dividing the money which she had on 
hand into separate parcels for her attendants, 
marking each parcel with the name. She sat 
down at the table when supper was served, 
and though she ate but little, she conversed as 
usual, in a cheerful manner, and with smiles. 
Her friends were silent and sad, struggling 
continually to keep back their tears. At the 
close of the supper Mary called for a cup of 
wine, and drank to the health of each one 
of them, and then asked them to drink to her. 
They took the cup, and, kneeling before her, 
complied with her request, though, as they 
did it, the tears would come to their eyes. 
:\Iary'then told them that she willingly for- 
gave them for all that they had ever done to 
displease her, and she thanked them for their 
long-continued fidelity and love. She also 
asked that they would forgive her for any- 



224 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

thing she might ever have done in respect to 
them which was inconsistent with her duty. 
They answered the request only with a re- 
newal of their tears. 

Mary spent the evening in w^riting two let- 
ters to her nearest relatives in France, and in 
making her will. The principal object of these 
letters was to recommend her servants to 
the attention and care of those to whom they 
were addressed, after she should be gone. 
She went to bed shortly after midnight, and it 
is said she slept. This would be incredible, if 
anything were incredible in respect to the 
workings of the human soul in a time of awful 
trial like this, which so transcends all the 
ordinary conditions of its existence. 

At any rate, whether Mary slept or not, the 
morning soon came. Her friends were around 
her as soon as she rose. She gave them mi- 
nute directions about the disposition of her 
body. She wished to have it taken to France 
to be interred, as she had requested of Eliza- 
beth, either at Rheims, in the same tomb with 
the body of her mother, or else at St. Denis, 
an ancient abbey a little north of Paris, where 
the ashes of a long line of French monarchs 
repose. She begged her servants, if possible, 
not to leave her body till it should reach its 
final home in one of these places of sepulture. 
In the mean time, arrangements had been 



THE END. 225 

made for the last act in this dreadful tragedy, 
in the same great hall where she had been 
tried. They raised a platform upon the stone 
floor of the hall large enough to contain those 
who were to take part in the closing scene. 
On this platform was a block, a cushion, and 
a chair. All these things, as well as the plat- 
form itself, were covered with black cloth, 
giving to the whole scene a most solemn and 
funereal expression. The part of the hall con- 
taining this scaffold was railed off from the 
rest. The governor of the castle, and a body 
of guards, came in and took their station at 
the sides of the room. Two executioners, one 
holding the ax, stood upon the scaffold on 
one side of the block. • Two of the commis- 
sioners stood upon the other side. The remain- 
ing commissioners and several gentlemen of 
the neighborhood took their places as spectators 
without the rail. The number of persons 
thus assembled was about two hundred. 
Strange that any one should have come in, 
voluntarily, to witness such a scene ! 

When all was ready, the sheriff, carrying his 
white wand of office, and attended by some 
of the commissioners, went for Mary. She 
was at her devotions, and she asked a little 
delay that she might conclude them : perhaps 
the shrinking spirit clung at the last moment 
to life, and wished to linger a few minutes 



226 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

longer before taking the final farewell. The 
request was granted. In a short time Mary- 
signified that she was ready, and they began 
to move toward the hall of execution. Her 
attendants were going to accompany her. 
The sheriff said this could not be allowed. 
She accordingly bade them farewell, and they 
filled the castle with the sound of their shrieks 
and lamentations. 

Mary went on, descending the staircase, at 
the foot of which she was joined by one of her 
attendants from whom she had been separated 
for some time. His name was Sir Andrew 
Melville, and he was the master of her house- 
hold. The name of her secretary Melville was 
James. Sir Andrew kneeled before her, kissed 
her hand, and said that this was the saddest 
hour of his life. Mary began to give him some 
last commissions and requests. *'Say," said 
she, "that I died firm in the faith ; that I for- 
give my enemies ; that I feel that I have never 
disgraced Scotland, my native country, and 
that I have been always true to France, the 

land of my happiest years. Tell my son " 

Here her voice faltered and ceased to be heard, 
and she burst into tears. 

She struggled to regain her composure. 
*^ Tell my son," said she, "that I thought of 
him in my last moments, and that I have never 
yielded, either by word or deed, to anything 



THE'EfTD. 227 

whatever that might lead to his prejudice. 
Tell him to cherish the memory of his mother, 
and say that I sincerely hope his life may be 
happier than mine has been." 

Mary then turned to the commissioners who 
stood by, and renewed her request that her at- 
tendants, who had just been separated from 
her, might come down and see her die. The 
commissioners objected. They said that if 
these attendants were admitted, their anguish 
and lamentations would only add to her own 
distress, and make the whole scene more pain- 
ful. Mary, however, urged the request. She 
said they had been devotedly attached to her 
all her days ; they had shared her captivity, 
and loved and served h^r faithfully to the end, 
and it was enough if she herself, and they, de- 
sired that they should be present. The com- 
missioners at last yielded, and allowed her to 
name six, who should be summoned to attend 
her. She did so, and the six came down. 

The sad procession then proceeded to the 
hall. Mary was in full court dress, and walked 
into the apartment with the air and com- 
posure of a reigning queen. She leaned on the 
arm of her physician. Sir Andrew Melville 
followed, bearing the train of her robe. Her 
dress is described as a gown of black silk, bor- 
dered with crimson velvet, over which was a 
satin mantle. A long veil of white crape, 



228 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

edged with rich lace, hung dov/n almost to the 
ground. Around her neck was an ivory cru- 
cifix — that is, an image of Christ upon the 
cross, which the Catholics use as a memorial 
of our Saviour's sufferings— and a rosary, which 
is a string of beads of peculiar arrangement, 
often employed by them as an aid in their de- 
votions. Mary meant, doubtless, by these sym- 
bols, to show to her enemies and to the world, 
that though she submitted to her fate without 
resistance, yet, so far as the contest of her life 
had been one of religious faith, she had no in- 
tention of yielding. 

Mary ascended the platform and took her 
seat in the chair provided for her. With the 
exception of stifled sobs here and there to be 
heard, the room was still. An officer then ad- 
vanced and read the warrant of execution, 
which the executioners listened to as their au- 
thority for doing the dreadful work which they 
were about to perform. The Dean of Peter- 
borough, the Protestant ecclesiastic whom 
Mary had refused to see, then came forward to 
the foot of the platform, and most absurdly com- 
menced an address to her, with a view to con- 
vert her to the Protestant faith. Mary inter- 
rupted him, saying that she had been born and 
had lived a Catholic, and she was resolved so 
to die • and she asked him to spare her use- 
less reasonings. The dean persisted in going 



THE END. 229 

on. Mary turned away from him, kneeled 
down, and began to offer a Latin prayer. The 
dean soon brought his ministrations to a close, 
and then Mary prayed for some time, in a dis- 
tinct and fervent voice, in English, the large 
company listening with breathless attention. 
She prayed for her own soul, and that she 
might have comfort from heaven in the agony 
of death. She implored God's blessing upon 
France ; upon Scotland ; upon England ; upon 
Queen Elizabeth ; and, more than all, upon her 
son. During this time she held the ivory cru- 
cifix in her hand, clasping it and raising it from 
time to time toward heaven. 

When her prayer was ended, she rose, and, 
with the assistance of her attendants, took off 
her veil, and such other parts of her dress as it 
was necessary to remove in order to leave the 
neck bare, and then she kneeled forward and 
laid her head upon the block. The agitation 
of the assembly became extreme. Some turned 
away from the scene faint and sick at heart ; 
some looked more eagerly and intensely at the 
group upon the scaffold ;* some wept and sobbed 
aloud. The assistant executioner put Mary's 
two hands together and held them ; the other 
raised his ax, and, after the horrid sound of 
two or three successive blows, the assistant 
held up the dissevered head saying, ** So perish 
all Queen Elizabeth's enemies." 



230 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

The assembly dispersed. The body was 
taken into an adjoining apartment, and pre- 
pared for interment. Mary's attendants wished 
to have it delivered to them, that they might 
comply with her dying request to convey it to 
France ; but they were told that they could 
not be allowed to do so. The body was in- 
terred with great pomp and ceremony in the 
Cathedral at Peterborough, where it remained 
in peace for many years. 

Now that the deed was done, the great prob- 
lem with Elizabeth was, of course, to avert the 
consequences of the terrible displeasure and 
thirst for revenge which she might naturally 
suppose it would awaken in Scotland and in 
France. She succeeded very well in accom- 
plishing this. As soon as she heard of the ex- 
ecution of Mary, she expressed the utmost sur- 
prise, grief, and indignation. She said that 
she had, indeed, signed the death-warrant, 
but it was not her intention at all to have it 
executed ; and that, when she delivered it to 
the officer, she charged him not to let it go out 
of his possession. This the officer denied. 
Elizabeth insisted, and punished the officer by 
a long imprisonment, and perpetual disgrace, 
for his pretended offense. She sent a messen* 
ger to James, explaining the terrible accident, 
as she termed it, which had occurred, and dep- 



THE END. 231 

recating his displeasure. James, though at 
first filled with indignation, and determined to 
avenge his mother's death, allowed himself to 
be appeased. 

About twenty years after this, Elizabeth 
died, and the great object of Mary's ambition 
throughout her whole life was attained by the 
union of the Scotch and English crowns on the 
head of her son. As soon as Elizabeth ceased 
to breathe, James the Sixth of Scotland was 
proclaimed James the First of England. He 
was at that time nearly forty years of age. 
He was married, and had several young 
children. The circumstances of King James's 
journey to London, when he went to take pos- 
session of his new kingdom, are related in the 
History of Charles I., belonging to this series. 
Though James thus became monarch of both 
England and Scotland, it must not be supposed 
that the two kingdoms were combined. They 
remained separate for many years — two inde- 
pendent kingdoms governed by one king. 

When James succeeded to the English throne, 
his mother had been dead many years, and 
whatever feelings of affection may have bound 
his heart to her in early life, they were now 
well-nigh obliterated by the lapse of time, and 
by the new" ties by which he was connected 
with his wife and his children. As soon as he 
was seated on his new throne, however, he 



232 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

ordered the Castle of Fotheringay, which had 




Mary's Tomb at Westminster Abbby. 

been the scene of his mother's trial andj death, 
to be leveled with the ground, and h^ trans- 



THE END. 233 

ferred her remains to Westminster Abbey, 
where they still repose. 

If the lifeless dust had retained its conscious- 
ness when it was thus transferred, with what 
intense emotions of pride and pleasure would 
the mother's heart have been filled, in being 
thus brought to her final home in that ancient 
sepulcher of the English kings, by her son, 
now, at last, safely established, where she had 
so long toiled and suffered to instate him, in 
his place in the line. Ambition was the great, 
paramount, ruling principle of Mary's life. 
Love was, with her, an occasional, though 
perfectly uncontrollable impulse, which came 
suddenly to interrupt her plans and divert her 
from her course, leaving- her to get back to it 
again, after devious wanderings, with great 
difficulty and through many tears. The love, 
with the consequences which followed from it, 
destroyed her ; while the ambition, recover- 
ing itself after every contest with its rival, and 
holding out perseveringly to the last, saved 
her son ; so that, in the long contest in which 
her life was spent, though she suffered all the 
way, and at last sacrificed herself, she tri- 
umphed in the end. 



Young People's Library. 

Price, 50 Cents Each. 

ROBINSON CRUSOE : His Life and Strange Surprising 
Adventures. With 70 beautiful illustrations by Walter 
Paget. Arranged for young readers. 

-There exists no work, either of instruction or entertainment, 
which has been more generally read, and universally admired. 
— Walter Scott. 
ALICE'S ADVENTURES IN WONDERLAND. With 42 
illustrations by John Tenniel. 

" This is Carroll's immortal sK.oxyr —Athcmeum 
"The most delightful of childrens stories. Elegant and ^^\x- 
ciowsnoTiS^n^t.^—Sattirda;^ Review. 

THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS AND WHAT 

ALICE FOUND THERE. (A companion to Alice in 

Wonderland.) With 50 illustrations by John Tenniel. 

- Not a whit inferior to its predecessor in grand extiavagance of 

imagination, and delicious allegorical nonsense. -Quarterly 

Review. 

BUNYAN'S PILGRIM'S PROGRESS. With 50 fuU-page 

and text illustrations. 

Pilgrim's Progress is the most popular story book in the 
world With the exception of the Bible it has been translated into 
more languages than any other book ever printed. 

A CHILD'S STORY OF THE BIBLE. With 72 full-page 
illustrations. • 

Tells in simple language and in a form fitted for the hands of 
the younger members of the Christian flock, the ta e of Gods 
deaUngs Ihh his Chos.n People under the Old Dispensation 
with ifs foreshadowings of the coming of that Messiah who was 
to make all mankind one fold under one Shepherd. _ ___^^ 



ALTEMUS' YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. 



A CHILD'S LIFE OF CHRIST. With 49 illustrations. 

G'jd has implanted in the infant's heart a desire to hear of Jesus, 
and children are early attracted and sweetly riveted by the won- 
derful Story of the Master from the Manger to the Throne. 

In this little book we have brought together from Scripture every 
incident, expression and description within the verge of their com- 
prehension, in the effort to weave them into a memorial garland of 
their Saviour. 

THE FABLES OF yESOP. Compiled from the best ac- 
cepted sources. AVith 62 illustrations. 

The fables of /Esop are among the very earliest compositions of 
this kind, and probably have never been surpassed for point and 
brevity, as well as for the practical good sense they display. In 
their grotesque grace, in their quaint humor, in their trust in the 
simpler virtues, in their insight into the cruder vices, in their inno- 
cence of the fact of sex, /Esop's Fables are as little children— and 
for that reason will ever find a home in the heaven of little chil- 
dren's souls. 

THE SWISS FAMILY ROBINSON, or the Adventures of 
a Shipwrecked Family on an Uninhabited Island. With 
50 illustrations. 

A remarkable tale of adventure that will interest the boys and 
girls. The father of the family tells the tale and the vicissitudes 
through which he and his wife and children pass, the wonderful 
discoveries they make, and the dangers they encounter. It is a 
standard work of adventure that has the favor of all who have 
read it. 

CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS AND THE DISCOVERY 
OF AMERICA. With 70 illustrations. 

It is the duty of every American lad to know the story of Chris- 
topher Columbus. In this book is depicted the story of his life 
and struggles ; of his persistent solicitations at the courts of Eu- 
rope, and his contemptuous receptions by the learned Geographical 
Councils, until his final employment by Queen Isabella. Records 
the day-by-day journeyings while he was pursuing his aim and his 
perilous way over the shoreless ocean, until he "gave to Spain a 
New World." Shows his progress through Spain on the occasion 
of his first return, when he was received with rapturous demon- 
strations ^nd piore than regal homage, Jiii displacement by tb^ 



ALTEMUS* YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. 



Odjeas, Ovandos and Bobadilas ; his last return in chains, and the 
story of his death in poverty and neglect. 

THE STORY OF EXPLORATION AND DISCOVERY 
IN AFRICA. With 80 illustrations. 

Records the adventures, privations, sufferings, trials, dangers 
and discoveries in developing the "Dark Continent," from the 
early days of Bruce and Mungo Park down to Livingstone and 
Stanley and the heroes of our own times. 

The reader becomes carried away by conflicting emotions of 
w^onder and sympathy, and feels compelled to pursue the story, 
which he cannot lay down. No present can be more acceptable 
than such a volume as this, where courage, intrepidity, resource 
and devotion are so pleasantly mingled. It is very fully illustra- 
ted with pictures worthy of the book. 

GULLIVER'S TRAVELS INTO SOME REMOTE RE- 
GIONS OF THE WORLD. With 50 illustrations. 

In description, even of the most common- place things, his power 
is often perfectly marvellous. Macau'ay says of Swift: " Under 
a plain garb and ungainly deportment were concealed some of the 
choicest gifts that ever have been bestowed on any of the children 
of men — rare powers of observation, brilliant art, grotesque inven- 
tion, humor of the mo^t austr-re flavor, yet exquisitely delicious, 
eloquence singularly pure, manly and perspicuous," 

MOTHER GOOSE'S RHYMES, JINGLES AND FAIRY 
TALES. With 300 illustrations. 

** In this edition an excellent choice has been made from the 
standard fiction of the little ones. The abundant pictures are well- 
drawn and graceful, the effect frequently striking and always deco- 
rative . " — Critic. 

** Only to see the book is to wish to give it to every child one 
knows." — Queen. 

LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS OF THE UNITED 
STATES. Compiled from authoritative sources. With 
portraits of the Presidents ; and also of the unsuccessful 
candidates for the office ; as well as the ablest of the 
Cabinet officers. 

This book should be in every home and school library. It tells, 
in an impartial way, the story of the political history of the United 
States, from the first Constitutional convention to the last Fteai* 



ALTEMUS* YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. 



dential nominations, it is just the book for intelligent boys, and it 
will help to make them intelligent and patriotic citizens. 

THE STORY OF ADVENTURE IN THE FROZEN 
SEA. With 70 illustrations. Compiled from authorized 
sources. 

We here have brought together the records of the attempts to 
reach the North Pole. Our object being to recall the stories of the 
early voyagers, and to narrate the recent efforts of gallant adven- 
turers of various nationalities to cross the " unknown and inacces- 
ible " threshold ; and to show how much can be accomplished by 
indomitable pluck and steady perseverance. Portraits and numer- 
ous illustrations help the narration. 

ILLUSTRATED NATURAL HISTORY. By the Rev. 
J. G. Wood. With 80 illustrations. 

Wood's Natural History needs no commendation. Its author 
has done more than any other writer to popularize the study. His 
work is known and admired overall the civilized world. The sales 
of his works in England and America have been enormous. The 
illustrations in this edition are entirely new, striking and life-like. 

A CHILD'S HISTORY OF ENGLAND. By Charles 
Dickens, With 50 illustrations. 

Dickens grew tired of listening to his children memorizing the 
old fashioned twaddle that went under the name of English his- 
tory. He thereupon wrote a book, in his own peculiarly happy 
style, primarily for the educational advantage of his own children, 
but was prevailed upon to publish the work, and make its use gen- 
eral. Its success was instantaneous and- abiding. 

BLACK BEAUTY; The Autobiography of a Horse. By 
Anna Sewell. With 50 illustrations. 

This NEW ILLUSTRATED EDITION is surc to Command attention. 
Wherever children are, whether boys or girls, there this Autobiog- 
raphy should be It inculcates habits of kindness to all members 
of the animal creation. The literary merit of the book is excellent. 

THE ARABIAN NIGHTS' ENTERTAINMENTS. With 
50 illustrations. Contains the most favorably known of 
the stories. 

The text is somewhat abridged and edited for the young. It 
forms an excellent introduction to those immortal tales which have 
helped so long to keep the weary world young. 



ALTEMUS' YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. 



ANDERSEN'S FAIRY TALES. By Hans Christian An- 
dersen. With 77 illustrations. 

The spirit of high moral teaching, and the delicacy of sentiment, 
feeling and expression that pervade these tales make these won- 
derful creations not only attractive to the young, but equally accept- 
able to those of mature years, who are able to understand their 
real significance and appreciate the depth of their meaning. 

GRIMM'S FAIRY TALES. With 50 illustrations. 

These tales of the Brothers Grimm have carried their names into 
every household of the civilized world. 

The Tales are a wonderful collection, as interesting, from a lit- 
erary point of view, as they are delightful as stories. 

GRANDFATHER'S CHAIR; A History for Youth. By 
Nathaniel Hawthorne. With 60 illustrations. 

The story of America from the landing of the Puritans to the 
acknowledgment witJiout reserve of the Independence of the 
United States, told with all the elegance, simplicity, grace, clear- 
ness and force for which Hajvthorne is conspicuously noted. 

FLOWER FABLES. By Louisa May Alcott. With colored 
and plain illustrations. 

A series of very interesting fairy tales by the most charming of 
American story-tellers. 

AUNT MARTHA'S CORNER CUPBOARD. By Mary 
and Elizabeth Kirby. With 60 illustrations. 

Stories about Tea, Coffee, Sugar, Rice and Chinaware, and 
other accessories of the well-kept Cupboard. A book full of in- 
terest for all the girls and many of the boys. 

WATER-BABIES; A Fairy Tale for a Land-Baby. By 
Charles Kingsley. With 94 illustrations. 

" Come read me my riddle, each good little man ; 
If you cannot read it, no grown-up folk can." 

.BATTLES OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. By 
Prescott Holmes. With 70 illustrations. 

A graphic and full history of the Rebellion of the American Col- 
onies from the yoke and oppression of Enj[lan4, with -tibe causes 



ALTEMUS' YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. 



that led thereto, arid including an account of the second war with 
Great Britain, and the War with Mexico. 

BATTLES OF THE WAR FOR THE UNION. By 
Prescott Holmes. With 80 illustrations. 

A correct and impartial account of the greatest civil war in the 
annals of history. Both of these histories of American wars are 
a necessary part of the education of all intelligent American boys 
and girls- 

YOUNG PEOPLE'S HISTORY OF THE WAR WITH 
SPAIN. By Prescott Holmes. With 89 illustrations. 

This history of our war with Spain, in 1898, presents in a plain, 
easy style the splendid achievements of our army and navy, and 
the prominent figures that came into the public view during that 
period. Its glowing descriptions, wealth of anecdote, accuracy • f 
statement and profusion of illustration make it a most desirable 
gift- book for young readers. 

HEROES OF THE UNITED STATES NAVY. By 
Hartwell James. With 65 illustrations. 

The story of ournavy is one of the most brilliant pages in the 
w -rld's history. The sketches and exploits contained in this vol- 
ume cover our entire naval history from tlie days of the honest, 
rough sailors cf Revolutionary times, with their cutlasses and 
boarding pikes, to the brief war of 1898, when our superbly ap- 
pointed warships destroyed Spain' s proud cruisers by- the merci- 
less accuracy of their fire. 

MILITARY HEROES OF THE UNITED STATES. 
By Hartwell James. With 97 illustrations. 

In this volume the brave lives and heroic deeds c f our military 
heroes, from Paul Revere to Lawton, are told in the most captiva- 
ting manner. » The material for the work has been gathered from 
the North and the South alike. The volume presents all the im- 
portant facts in a manner enabling the youiTg people of our united 
and prosperous land to easily become familiar with the command- 
ing figures that have arisen in our military history. 

UNCLE TOM'S CABIN; or Life Among the Lowly. By 
Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe. With 90 ilAistrations. 



ALTEMUS' YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. 7 

The unfailing interest in the famous old story suggested the need 
of an edition specially prepared for young readers, and elaborately 
illustrated^ This edition completely fills that want. 

SEA KINGS AND NAVAL HEROES. By Hartwell 
James. With 50 illustrations. 

The most famous sea battles of the world, with sketches of the 
lives, enterprises and achievements of men who have become fam- 
ous in naval history. They are stories of brave lives in times of 
trial and danger, charmingly told for young people. 

POOR BOYS' CHANCES. By John Habberton. With 
50 illustrations. 

There is a fascination about the writings of the author of 
" Helen's Babies," from which none can escape. In this charm- 
ing volume, Mr. Habberton tells the boys of America how they 
can attain the highest positions in the land, without the struggles 
and privations endured by poor boys who rose to eminence and 
fame in former times. 

ROMULUS, the Founder of Rome. By Jacob Abbott. 
With 49 illustrations. 

In a plain and connected narrative, the author tells the stories 
of the founder of Rome and his great ancestor, /Eneas. These 
are of necessity somewhat legendary in character, but are pre- 
sented precisely as they have come down to us from ancient times. 
They are prefaced by an account of the life and inventions of Cad- 
mus, the ** Father of the Alphabet," as he is often called. 

CYRUS THE GREAT, the Founder of the Persian Empire. 
By Jacob Abbott. With 40 illustrations. 

For nineteen hundred years, the story of the founder of ihe an- 
cient Persian empire has been read by every generation of man- 
kind. The story of the life and actions of Cyrus, as told by the 
author, presents vivid pictures of the magnificence of a monarchy 
that rose about five hundred years before the Christian era, and 
rolled on in undisturbed magnitude aad gl^iy for many centuries. 

ADVENTURES IN TOYLAND. By Edith King Hull. 
With 70 illustrations by Alice B. Woodward. 

The sayings and doings of the dwellers in toyland, related by 
one of them to a dear little girl. It is a delightful book for chil- 
dren, and admirably illustrated. 



8 ALTEMUS* YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. 

DARIUS THE GREAT, King of the Medes and Persians. 
By Jacob Abbott. With 34 illustrations. 

No great exploits marked the career of this monarch, who was 
at one time the absolute sovereign of nearly one-half of the world. 
He reached his high position by a stratagem, and left behind him 
no strong impressions of personal character, yet, the history of his 
life and reign should be read along with those of Cyrus, Caesar, 
Hannibal and Alexander. 

XERXES THE GREAT, King of Persia. By Jacob Ab- 
bott. With 39 illustrations. 

For ages the name of Xerxes has been associated in the minds 
of men with the idea of the highest attainable human magnificence 
and grandeur. He was the sovereign of the ancient Persian em- 
pire at the height of its prosperity and power. The invasion of 
Greece by the Persian hordes, the battle of Thermopylae, the burn- 
ing of Athens, and the defeat of the Persian galleys at Salamis are 
chapters of thrilling interest. 

THE ADVENTURES OF A BROWNIE. By Miss 
Mulock, author of John Halifax, Gentleman, etc. With 
18 illustrations. 

One of the best of Miss Murlock's charming stories for children. 
All the situations are amusing and are sure to please youthful 
readers. 

ALEXANDER THE GREAT, King of Macedon. By 
Jacob Abbott. With 51 illustrations. 

Born heir to the throne of Macedon, a country on the confines 
of Europe and Asia, Alexander crowded into a brief career of 
twelve years a brilliant series of exploits. The readers of to-day 
will find pleasure and profit in the history of Alexander the Great, 
a potentate before w^hom ambassadors and princes from nearly all 
the nations of the earth bowed in humility. 

PYRRHUS, King of Epirus. By Jacob Abbott. With 45 
illustrations. 

The story of Pyrrhus is one of the ancient narratives which has 
been told and retold for many centuries in the literature, eloquence 
and poetry of all civilized nations. While possessed of extraordi- 
nary ability as a military leader, Pyrrhus actually accomplished 
nothing, but did mischief on a gigantic scale. He was naturally 



ALTEMUS' YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. 9 

of a noble and generous spirit, but only succeded in perpetrating 
crimes against the peace and welfare of mankind. 

HANNIBAL, the Carthaginian. By Jacob Abbott. With 
37 illustrations. 

Hannibal's distinction as a warrior was gained during the des- 
perate contests between Rome and Carthage, known as the Punic 
wars. Entering the scene when his country was engaged in peace- 
ful traffic with the various countries of the known world, he turned 
its energies into military aggression, conquest and war, becoming 
himself one of the greatest military heroes the world has ever 
known. 

MIXED PICKLES. By Mrs. E. M. Field. With 31 illus- 
trations by T. Pym. 

A remarkably entertaining story for young people. The reader 
is introduced to a charming little girl whose mishaps while trying 
to do good are very appropriately termed " Mixed Pickles." 

JULIUS CiESAR, the Roman Conqueror. By Jacob Ab- 
bott. With 44 illustrations. 

The life and actions of Julius Csesar embrace a period in Roman 
history beginning with the civil wars of Marius and Sylla and end- 
ing with the tragic death of Czesar Imperator. The work is an 
accurate historical account of the life and times of one of the great 
miUtary figures in history, in fact, it is history itself, and as such is 
especially commended to the readers of the present generation, 

ALFRED THE GREAT, of England. By Jacob Abbott. 
With 40 illustrations. 

In a certain sense, Alfred appears in history as the founder of 
the British monarchy ; his predecessors having governed more like 
savage chieftains than English kings. The work has a special 
value for young readers, for the character of Alfred was that of an 
honest, conscientious and far-seeing statesman. The romantic 
story of Godwin furnishes the concluding chapter of t'ne volume. 

WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR, of England. By Jacob 
Abbott. With 43 illustrations. 

The life and times of William of Normandy have always been a 
fiiiitful theme for the historian. War and pillage and conquest 
were at least a part of the everyday business of men in both Ehq- 



lO ALTEMUS' YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. 



land and France : and the story of William as told by the author 
of this volume makes some of the most fascinating pages in his- 
tory. It is especially delightful to young readers. 

HERNANDO CORTEZ, the Conqueror of Mexico. By 
Jacob Abbott. With 30 illustrations. 

In this volume the author gives vivid pictures of the wild and 
adventurous career of Cortez and his companions in the conquest 
of Mexico. Many good motives were united with those of ques- 
tionable character, in the prosecution of his enterprise, but in 
those days it was a maiter of national ambition to enlarge the 
boundaries of nations and to extend their commerce at any cost. 
The career of Cortez is oue of absorbing interest. 

THE LITTLE LAME PRINCE. By Miss Mulock. With 
24 illustrations. 

The author styles it "A Parable for Old and Young." It is in her 
happiest vein and delightfully interesting, especially to youthful 
readers. 

MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. By Jacob Abbott. With 
45 illustrations. 

The story of Mary Stuart holds a prominent place in the present 
series of historical narrations. It has had many tellings, for the 
melancholy story of the unfortunate queen has always held a high 
place in the estimation of successive generations of readers. Her 
story is full of rom.ance and pathos, and the reader is carried along 
by conflicting emotions cf wonder and sympathy. 

QUEEN ELIZABETH, of England. By Jacob Abbott. 
With 49 illustrations. 

In strong contrast to the story of Mary, Queen of Scots, is that 
of Elizal»eth, Queen of England. They were cousins, yet im- 
placable foes. Elizabeth's reign was in many ways a glorious one, 
and her successes gained her the applause of the world. The 
stirring tales of Drake, Hawkins and other famous mariners of 
her lime have been incorporated mto the story of Elizabeth's Jife 
and reign. 

KING CHARLES THE FIRST, of England. By Jacob 
Abbott. With 41 illustrations. 

The well-known figures in the stormy reign of Charles I. are 
brought forward in this narrative of his life and times. It is his- 
tory told in the most fascinating manner, and embraces the early 



ALTEMUS' YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. II 

Kfe of Charles ; the court of James I,; struggles between Charles 
and the Parliament ; the Civil war ; the trial and execution of the 
king. The narrative is impartial and holds the attention of the 
reader. 

KING CHARLES THE SECOND, of England. By Jacob 
Abbott. With 38 illustrations. 

Beginning with his infancy, the life of the ** Merry Monarch " 
is related in the author's inimitable style. His reign was signal- 
ized by many disastrous events, besides those that related to his 
personal troubles and embarrassments. There were unfortunate 
wars ; naval defeats ; dangerous and disgraceful plots and con- 
spiracies. Trobule sat very lightly on the shoulders of Charles II., 
however, and the cares of state were easily forgotten in the society 
of his court and dogs. 

THE SLEEPY KING. By Aubrey Hopwood and Seymour 
Hicks. With 77 illustrations by Maud Trelawney. 

A charmingly- told Fairy Tale, full of delightrauiL-entertain- 
ment. The illustrations are original and striking^ adding greatly 
to the interest of the text. ' ^ 

MARIA ANTOINETTE, Queen of France. By John S. C. 
Abbott. With 42 illustrations. 

The tragedy of Maria Antoinette is one of the most mournful in 
the history of the world. " Her beauty dazzled the whole king- 
dom," says Lamartine. Her lofty and unbendin;^ spirit under 
unspeakable indignities and atrocities, enlists and holds the sympa- 
thies of the readers of to-day, as it has done in the past. 

MADAME ROLAND, A Heroine of the French Revolution. 
By Jacob Abbott. With 42 illustrations. 

The French Revolution developed fe»w, if any characters more 
worthy of notice than that of Madame Roland. The absence of 
playmates, in her youth, inspired her with an insatiate thirst for 
knowledge, and books became her constant companions in every 
unoccupied hour. She fell a martyr to the tyrants of the French 
Revolution, but left behind her a car'^er full of instruction that 
never fails to impress itself up'T the reader. 

JOSEPHINE, Empress of France. By Jacob Abbott. With 
4C illustrations* 



12 ALTEMUS* YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY. 



Maria Antoinette beheld the dawn of the French Revoluiion ; 
Madame Roland perished under the lurid glare of its high nt n ; 
Josephine saw it fade into darkness. She has been called 
*' Star of Napoleon ; " and it is certain that she added lui 
his brilliance, and that her peisuasive influence was often exertt.d 
to win a friend or disarm an adversary. The lives of the Empress 
Josephine, of Mari.i Antoinette, and of Madame Roland are 
especially commended to young lady readers, 

TALES FROM SHAKESPEARE. By Charles and Mary 
Lamb. With 80 illustrations. 

The text is somewhat abridged and edited for young people, but 
a clear and definite outline of each play is presented. Such episodes 
or incidental sketches of character as are not absolutely necessary 
to the development of the tales are omitted, while the many moral 
lessons that lie in Shakespeare's plays and make them valuable in 
the training of the young are retained. The book is winning, help- 
ful and an effectual guide to the "inner shrine" of the great 
dramatist. 

MAKERS OF AMERICA. By Hartwell James. With 75 
illustrations. 

This ^olume contains attractive and suggestive sketches of the 
lives and deeds of men who illustrated some special phase in the 
political, religious or social life of our country, from its settlement 
to the close of the eighteenth century. It affords an opportunity 
for young readers to become easily familiar with these characters 
and their historical relations to the building of our Republic. An 
account of the discovery of America prefaces the work, 

A WONDER BOOK FOR BOYS AND GIRLS. By 

Nathaniel Hawthorne. With 50 ii •♦■rp<-inn« 

In this volume the genius of Ha>, uoiuc i^as shaped anew 
wonder tales that have been hallowed by an antiqui of two or 
three thousand years. Seeming " never to have been i ide" they 
are legitimate subjects for every age to clothe with its t " - 
as to manners and sentiment, and its own views of morai'** 
volume has a charm for old and young alike, for the auu 
not thought it necessary to "write downward" in order tc 
the comprehension of children. 



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